


Lucidity

by PuppetMaster55



Series: What Makes A Jinchuuriki [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everyone Has Issues, For the most part, Jinchuuriki-centric, Misunderstandings, fixing the lack of worldbuilding around the other hidden villages, misunderstandings everywhere, throwing canon out the window
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-17
Updated: 2016-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-09 17:27:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 50
Words: 231,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4357949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuppetMaster55/pseuds/PuppetMaster55
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the wake of Sasuke's defection, Naruto finds himself in a rare position for a shinobi: banishment. But such things are not so simple, for what is a Jinchuuriki's Child?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. It Begins

**Author's Note:**

> So, this originally was over on ff.net, but I'm moving it over here so it can be cross-posted. I'll be spending the next few days copying what I already have published there, here.

There was a sort of pall in the air, Kakashi idly mused as he approached the Valley of the End, where his two students- promising young Shinobi both- were fighting. He felt disgusted in Sasuke's behavior, as he had disobeyed the very advice that Kakashi had given barely twenty-four hours earlier.

And loathe as he is to admit it, Sasuke will have to pay for his actions, last of his clan or no.

The sky darkened as he approached the cliff face that separated the land of fire from the land of sound, and the pall in the air thickened, making it rather trying in terms of breathing normally. For civilians, it might seem as though the air was too thick to breathe, but for as seasoned a Jonin as him, it was hardly noticeable.

The scene he came upon, however, could not be so lightly ignored.

~~***~~

Rasengan.

Chidori.

Both are powerful jutsu in their own rights, even working to counterbalance each other in terms of chakra usage.

Rasengan, the ultimate form of shape transformation. So powerfully condensed that, in the right hands, it could rend even the most powerful of barriers to dust

Chidori, the ultimate form of nature transformation. What it lacks in destructive power it more than makes up for in its ability to pierce almost anything that it comes across.

Kakashi had only once wondered what would happen if the two were to clash and that had been three days ago, not even. He had come to the conclusion that the outcome of such a thing would kill both users.

Apparently, he hadn't taken into account two things:

One: he practically inhuman regenerative power that the Kyuubi gave Naruto.

Two: the Curse Seal, level 2.

Granted, Kakashi only knew about one of those two, and had only the barest of information on the other, but he had thought that he knew exactly what would happen should the two jutsu go against each other.

But because of the two things he hadn't taken into account, he was wrong.

And all the proof was in front of him.

Sasuke watched on as Naruto lay where he'd been launched. He knew, _he knew,_ that had either of their aim been off by even the slightest of millimeters, then both of their jutsu would have been exponentially more powerful from drawing on the other, killing both users.

Luck, Sasuke thought, was the only thing that kept them alive. Was the only thing keeping Naruto alive.

 _But not anymore._ Sasuke thought, standing over his ex-teammate. _Your luck has run out, Naruto._

He pulled out a Kunai, his chakra reserves too diminished to do another jutsu, and moved to strike.

The next thing he saw was the angry red of Naruto's eyes before being launched back. _How could he still have power?_ Sasuke calculated his chances of winning the fight as is, then made a wise decision: leave Naruto alive and kill him another day.

And it was the last that anyone of Konoha would see of Uchiha Sasuke for years to come.

Kakashi snapped himself out of his stupor, what was he doing, standing there gaping like an academy student in the presence of the Hokage? He rushed forth to catch the fleeing Sasuke, but was stopped by a swipe from Naruto.

"Naruto, what-" was all Kakashi let out before he met the red eyes of his student, and realized the truth.

That wasn't Naruto he was fighting, it was Kyuubi.

"So Kakashi-Sensei, you're my next opponent, are you?" Naruto's voice cut through the air like glass. Kakashi was floored. _Naruto was in control?_ And he was still attacking his teacher like they were enemies.

Kakashi dodged another swipe, then a kick, before retaliating with one of his own. He reached into his pouch, pulling out something he never thought he'd have to utilize.

Back when Kakashi had made the passing of Team 7 official, the Sandaime had given him a small bundle of chakra-suppressing seals, as it was entirely possible that Naruto would have to draw upon Kyuubi's chakra, and they had no basis for how much control he would have.

The Sandaime had shared the whole truth to Naruto, that the Shodai's wife had been the first Jinchuuriki for Kyuubi, and Naruto's mother the second, with Naruto being the third. He also said that Mito had never had need to call upon Kyuubi's chakra, and that Kushina's chakra was somehow particularly effective in controlling Kyuubi's chakra. As such, there was no idea how it would affect Naruto, as he _would_ have need to use the demonic chakra, and it was quite obvious that Naruto didn't have the same chakra anomaly that his mother had.

At the time, such a thing had seemed quite idiotic. After all, how could Naruto, naïve, cheerful Naruto, lose himself in a bloody rage?

Kakashi had just found out how wrong they'd been.

He moved in close, slapping one of the seals upon Naruto, before suitably restraining him and heading back to Konoha. Kakashi could feel it in his heart: he'd lost the last remaining family of his friend, and shortly after, may have lost the only remaining tie to his Sensei.

He was too late.

Always too late.

~~***~~

 

The return had been unnaturally somber. Sakura stood vigil at the gate, having seen the team of medics come and pass, waiting for her Sensei to return with her teammates in tow. She had become even more distraught at the sight of the injured members of the team that had returned thus far, and was afraid of how horribly injured Sasuke and Naruto- no, not Naruto. He'd had a bad habit of bouncing back from injury almost immediately, he'd just have a few scrapes, probably a broken arm to complain about. _Yeah, Naruto will be alright._ Sakura affirmed, calmer than before.

Which was why she was stunned to see that, when the final group of Med-nins returned with Kakashi (not even five minutes had passed since the group escorting Lee and, Sakura shivered, Gaara, had returned) carrying a _bound_ Naruto.

"Sensei, what happened? Why's Naruto tied up? Where's Sasuke?" She looked up to her teacher in the hope that he would give her words of comfort.

All she got in return was that the mission was a failure and to head home and await further orders.

And suddenly it all made sense.

Mission failure.

Mission… failure.

Failure.

Sasuke wasn't coming back, and something had happened to Naruto- maybe he'd just been too stubborn and Kakashi had had to restrain and knock him out. Sakura nodded to herself, once more comforted by her own conclusions.

After all, for what reason would Kakashi have to restrain Naruto outside of his stubbornness?


	2. Alienation

The room was white, almost blindingly so. The room itself bare, save for a single hospital bed, with a patient strapped upon it. At the moment, the boy, 13 years of age, was only wearing a black T-shirt and solid blue boxers. His blond hair was spread across his head, framing his tanned face, where each cheek held three black lines- birthmarks, with startling perfection.

 _He looks almost peaceful_ , Tsunade mused, as she checked over him one last time for the night.

"No injuries. Patient is presently unconscious and restrained due to uncharacteristic aggression." Tsunade muttered under her breath and into a voice recorder, an old habit that doctors and Med-nins got into long ago. Her hand was glowing green with the effects of the Mystical Palm Jutsu. She moved to his head, turning it to the side with her other hand. "No chemical imbalances, but Limbic System appears inflamed. Attempting to hea-"

Tsunade was cut short as her Mystical Palm turned against her, becoming red and scalding her. She put an end to the Jutsu and set about fixing her burned hand.

"I believe I've found the source of the aggression. It appears to be an annex of condensed chakra that has contained itself within the Limbic System. Whether it is there because of patient's affliction or something else has yet to be known." She continued, consummate professional that she was, and was careful to avoid mentioning Kyuubi. After all, you never know who might listen to the recording. "Tomorrow I stop the sedatives for the patient's safety, and Jiraiya will come by that afternoon to perform his own check, as the presence of condensed chakra calls for his expertise."

~~***~~

Tsunade is a professional, and she prides herself on remaining calm in even the most dire of medical situations, yet when Kakashi had come to her begging that she fix his student in the most heartbroken of voices she had first thought that Naruto was dying. Her first order of business was to remove the Chakra-Restraining Seal, as such a thing was dangerous for the patient.

Medical Jutsu relied as much on the chakra of the patient as it did the user. It worked by turning the user's chakra into a bastardized version of Nature Energy, allowing the user to copy the patient's chakra and manipulate it to heal the patient. Though there was the potential for backlash, for if the patient's chakra was overly unique, like having an elemental Kekkei Genkai, then it would attack the user, whose body was unused to using such a chakra.

And so, Tsunade removed the Chakra-Restraining Seal at the protest of Kakashi.

Naruto had stirred as Tsunade started healing him.

Kakashi's heart almost stopped when Naruto swiftly moved to rip out Tsunade's throat, but he was able to restrain him before that happened. Tsunade hadn't known about Naruto's odd aggression, and had immediately ordered that he be restrained.

Naruto had bit, scratched and kicked as he was placed in the restraints, and had begun spouting obscenities at them, saying that they were idiots, weaklings, that they deserved to die. She didn't know what had gotten into him.

And then he'd turned on her.

He'd begun by saying how pathetic she was, how it was all her fault. She wasn't strict enough to make her brother patient, so he had rushed out into the battle and died. She wasn't a good enough medic, as she hadn't been able to keep her lover, her fiancé, alive.

He'd flung all kinds of insults at her after that, but it was those that had hurt the worst. She'd finally regained her composure while he was childishly taunting her through song, and ordered that he be heavily sedated, and to keep him under sedation for as long as they could.

That had been a week ago.

~~***~~

"Come on Sensei, Naruto wakes up today!" Ino scolded her teacher, who was starting to lag far behind her. Next to him was her teammate, Shikamaru. "You too, you lazy bum."

The passersby would later swear that they heard the young Nara boy breathe, literally breathe, the word "Troublesome".

Granted, Team 10 was not alone in their trek to the hospital. The remainder of Teams 8, 7 and Gai were also with them, going to visit not just Naruto, but their injured teammates and friends, who were good enough to move around.

All of them were planning on being there as Naruto woke up.

While the students were chattering on and on about what was new in their lives, the Jonin-Sensei weren't as joyous about the news concerning Naruto. The official story was that Naruto's injuries had forced the med-nin to place him in a medically-induced coma, so as to spare him from the pain of recovery, but Kakashi had known the truth; had been there as the med-nins held down Naruto's arm and stabbed him with the needle; had been there as Tsunade made everyone, with the exception of Kakashi, who knew that she would need consoling, leave while she broke down crying, cradling Kakashi as if he was her lifeline. He, however, did not need consoling himself. That part of him had died when he'd learned that Naruto was in control and not using the Kyuubi's chakra. Had died when he saw Sasuke leave forever and had failed to stop him.

Kakashi had told the Jonin-Sensei of Naruto's former classmates and friends, and they appeared insufficiently wary, in Kakashi's eyes.

"Kakashi-Sensei, were you even listening to me?"

"Hmm, yes. What is it, Sakura?" Thank god he'd been able to fake being like he was before. First chance he'd get, Kakashi would go back into ANBU, and there he would remain for the rest of his days, if all went in his favor.

"I said we're here. Now, which room is Naruto in. They wouldn't allow visitors before." She looked put off about that little bit of information, and went off on a bunch of dark mutterings about 'how could you disturb the patient if the doctor's put them in a coma'. She'd been distraught over hearing that the mission was a failure, and had spent several days moping before Ino had gotten to her. She told Sakura that it was unbecoming of budding Kunoichi like them to spend all their time wallowing in their feelings when they just needed to get stronger. She then revealed that she'd been exaggerating her feelings for Sasuke for all this time just to provoke Sakura into becoming more outspoken. Sakura took to the advice and was back to her old self in no time, even going so far as to reconcile her friendship with Ino.

Kakashi made a well-timed eye-smile at the antics of his student, before mentioning that Naruto was in the second floor of the South ward. What he didn't mention was that the South ward held all the violent patients.

Thank god the rooms were soundproofed.

~~***~~

"You have good timing, I was just about to pull him off the sedatives and wake him up." Migaki, the med-nin in charge, said. He was a rather unassuming man, with short, dark-almost-black hair and equally dark eyes. He wore the traditional Med-nin scrubs with a scrub cap upon his head.

Sakura was relieved. For a second there, her fear had taken over and made her think that something had come up and he had had to be put back in the coma. She stood with the rest of the Konoha 12- the Konoha 11 as Naruto began stirring. Choji and Neji were wheelchair-bound while Kiba had been healed enough that he could walk, and had worn a simple tee and a pair of shorts, both a dark brownish-black.

Naruto woke up, and immediately began groaning. He made to clutch his head, but was stopped by the restraints, the action making their presence known to the Genin (and one Chunin) present.

"Hey, Naruto. How are you feeling?" Sakura's soft words didn't seem to have an effect, and Migaki began to tell her about how he might not be completely lucid, and to not have high hopes for good conversation when Naruto interrupted him.

"How am I feeling? Well, I was feeling good until your weak ass decided to reveal itself." His eyes opened, the irises blood-red, but nobody really took note of such a thing compared to what he'd just said.

"Naruto, why'd you say such a thing?" Sakura tried to make light of his insult, while the others were too shocked to speak.

"I said it 'cause that's what you are. Weak. What, you decide to come here to reaffirm that you're a better ninja than I am? Heh, or maybe you're here to cover up that you know you're weak, and hope that you can keep up your façade that you're a competent Kunoichi, when everyone here knows that you'd rather spend more time on your looks than train." Naruto's words were like ice in the heart, cutting Sakura and freezing the blood in her veins beyond belief.

"Don't say such a stupid thing, you idiot." Ino retaliated in Sakura's defense, and Naruto turned on her.

"Like you're much better. Unlike her, you actually had potential, but chose to waste it for what? The sake of a friend that fought you every chance she got? Had you been smarter, you would've won you match in the preliminaries." Now Ino was sent reeling from his words, and her teammates went to her defense.

"Naruto." Shikamaru got his attention. "This isn't you, remember?"

"Actually, Shikamaru, this is me, and you're smart enough to notice it. In fact, you're such a brainiac that you don't account for the variables. How's it feel, to know that the very first mission you led was such a failure. To know that it was your actions that almost got everybody killed? That-"

"That's enough." Asuma wasn't happy. Far from it. He'd heard that Naruto wasn't like the rumors had said. That he wasn't the monster that everybody'd thought he was. And he thought that he had been smart in not believing them, when he saw the kid's performance in the preliminaries and against the Hyuga boy. Now, however, he was calling his decision into question. "Don't think I'll just sit back and let you insult my students-"

"Of course not, it's very obvious that you're fond of them, just like everyone knows that you are Kurenai are dating."

"We are not-" Kurenai began to retort, but was cut off.

"Of course you are, it's obvious to everyone that the two of you are dancing the horizontal tango." Naruto cut them off, eliciting flustered, half-hearted denials.

"Naruto, that was very unyouthful of you." Lee joined the conversation, Gai agreeing with him.

"Unyouthful, you say? Perhaps what's 'unyouthful'," Naruto made the word sound like the worst of insults. "Is that you think that you can survive as a ninja when you are incapable of using the most basic of Jutsu. There will come a time when sheer strength will get you killed, Lee.

"And as for you, Gai, you hide behind your words of youth to deceive people into thinking that you're just a coward. Coward, always running to be better than your idol, your so-called rival." Naruto's face, which everyone half-expected to be marred with a crazed look, instead only held pure, icy calculation. His eyes were like crimson glaciers. "All of you are weak. Choji, too self-conscious about his size to reach his potential. Neji, working himself ragged to prove an idiotic point to his uncle. Kiba, your pride speaks for itself, and it says that it will be your death. Hell, it was almost the death of your precious puppy."

Kiba had to be held back until the comment about almost killing Akamaru reached his ears.

"Tenten, always working to prove that she'll be more than average, when she knows that she's already reached her potential." The Kunoichi in question shifted uncomfortably. While the two hadn't exactly been close, their friendship was really only in passing. "Shino, Shino, Shino. No matter how hard you try, your emotions lead your actions, and that's why people are wary of you. It's not that you have a hive of bugs living and crawling inside of you, but rather that you aren't as in control of you emotions as you think you are, and that scares people away. You'll be lucky to find a girl, the way you are.

"And finally, Kakashi-Sensei." Naruto had turned to Kakashi, who had been slowly moving towards the door behind the distraught group of people. "So caring, despite how aloof you appear. Tell me, does your heart have anything left in it, or are you already faking that you haven't died inside?"

Kakashi had frozen, his hand upon the door handle, and just stood there. He said nothing, which prompted Naruto to further taunt him.

"I don't blame you really. After all, everyone you opened your heart to left you, either dying or turning traitor. Your old team died and left you alone when you needed them most, your most promising student turned traitor the first chance he got, and let's not forget your father. He-"

And just like that, Kakashi snapped. He had to be held back from killing Naruto, all the Jonin restraining him. Gai had him in an arm-hold, his hands joined behind Kakashi's head. Asuma was restraining his legs, and Kurenai had to put him in her best incapacitating Genjutsu. Naruto had stopped speaking, opting instead to simply grin like the cat that caught the canary.

"Let's leave." Asuma's cold words worked to bring the others out of their stupor, the door was opened and it was as though the floodgates were opened in full. Everyone left, and Naruto started to laugh.

"That's right. Leave. Leave like the weak cowards you are!" He laughed after them, the words sticking to the group.

The door closed, and Naruto was left to himself.


	3. Dangerous

"It isn't the seal." The voice of a man cuts through the air, disturbing the almost- silence of the room. The only sound being the grunting of the patient restrained to the bed as he tried to kill the almost-7-foot-tall man leaning above him.

Naruto's mouth had been gagged after he'd harshly bitten the Med-nin who'd come in for the routine check-up. The man, a rather inexperienced med-nin with a fair bit of potential, lost a chunk of skin and had to have one of his fingers reattached. After it was wrestled out of Naruto's mouth, though. Ugai had almost resigned.

"Then what's causing the demonic chakra in his Limbic System?" Tsunade hid it well, but Jiraiya could easily pick up the undercurrent of desperation. Looking at the red-eyed boy next to him, who was eying the Sannin like he was a piece of meat to be had, he sighed.

"I've some theories about it, but I don't think you'll like either of them."

"What are they?" This time, hope was prevalent in her voice.

"The first is that it's some of Kyuubi's chakra that simply was pulled from the seal, but somehow lingered in the part of his brain that acts as the conduit for him to draw upon it. If that was the case, then it should be easy to simply heal away." Jiraiya looked at Tsunade, and instantly knew that she'd already tried it. And obviously failed. He sighed, moving on to the other option so as to not make her feel any worse. "The second isn't something I'd like to even consider, but given the circumstances surrounding him-"

"What else is going on, Jiraiya?" Ah, a hint of his teammate as she was at her prime. He had no choice but to tell her the truth.

"The reason it took me so long to get here was that I was at Myoboku. The Toads are in a flurry. When Naruto signed the contract, it was in blood. Binding and, as it should be, irreversible. But his signature is evaporating into nothing, and when it's completely gone, so is his Summoning Contract with the Toads." They fell into silence, looking at the child in-between them, who was looking at the both of them, as if deciding which of the two would be tastier. _Perhaps he is,_ Jiraiya mused regretfully.

He'd failed to protect his godson.

"What about your other theory?" Tsunade broke him out of his negative spiraling.

"The second theory is that this is a function of the seal that I don't know about. That this was supposed to happen. I doubt that's the answer, but there's nothing to suggest that it isn't." He looked away, defeated.

"Then what do we do?" Tsunade looked lost at the hopelessness of the situation.

"I've done what I can. You're the Hokage, so anything else is up to you." Jiraiya didn't say what was on both of their minds.

_Is there anything left of our Naruto?_

 ~~***~~

Team Gai wasn't the same. Gai had been somber for several hours afterward, until he suddenly sprang up anew, shouting that he will do everything in his power to prove Naruto's words wrong. Lee was the same, until a rousing speech from Gai about the Ninja of old having no chakra at all, yet still being the greatest made his vigor return with a vengeance. Tenten consoled herself with the knowledge that she still had many skills that she could refine and build up. Neji had openly admitted that he originally had become so strong to spite his uncle, but that now he was working hard to prove to his father that he could make his own choices. It was the same as before.

And yet, nothing was the same.

~~***~~

Teams 10 and 8 certainly changed after that day with Naruto. Asuma and Kurenai had stopped their relationship until both of them were okay with the idea of openly dating.

Choji had recently been released from the hospital, but he didn't have much of an appetite, worrying his parents.

Ino had gone into her training with a vengeance, utterly determined to prove that she had what it takes to make Chunin. The action hadn't gone unnoticed by Sakura, who'd quickly joined her. Both of them had made up, and silently chose to forgive and forget.

Shikamaru had practically fallen into a kind of depression. The weight of his failed mission, compounded by Naruto's words, had gotten to him, but it was the words of his father one night that helped him get past it. Now, Team 10 was on the road to recovery.

Team 8, on the other hand, was a veritable mess. Kiba had taken Naruto's cutting words to heart, and now was nursing a heavy grudge at Naruto. Sure, some part of him knew that Naruto wasn't in his right mind, but he couldn't just take what he'd said without some form or retribution.

Shino had been rather closed off, but his behavior suggested that the blonde's remarks hit too close for comfort.

The group could only figure that it was simply Hinata's meek appearance that kept her safe from Naruto's wrath, while Hinata simply took it that somewhere, deep down, Naruto remembered his promise to protect her, and that it proved that he was still in there.

Team 8 feared that her conclusion was wrong, and didn't know how they could deal with the fallout of Naruto and Hinata.

~~***~~

The room was simple enough. There was a low-set coffee table in the middle of the small room, with two couches on either side of it. On the upper wall to the right of the door were 4 pictures, each of a different man. These people were the previous Hokages, and soon there was to be a fifth picture, of a woman with amber eyes, dirty blond hair, and a grey-purple diamond tattoo on the middle of her forehead.

That woman, Senju Tsunade, was currently in the room, waiting with her two elderly advisors, a bespectacled man by the name of Mitokado Homura, and a woman with her hair done up in a bun, Utatane Koharu. They were awaiting the fourth member of their party, the unofficial third advisor, Shimura Danzo, a man just as old as the other advisors, whose only defining feature was the bandages that covered his right eye and arm. The man in question entered the quiet room, and sat down next to Tsunade.

"Now that we are all here, we can begin to discuss the matter at hand." Koharu spoke first.

"Uzumaki Naruto." Danzo put forth his thoughts on the matter. "He's gone berserk after overusing the Kyuubi."

"That's right." Tsunade confirmed. "Naruto's currently restrained in the South Ward of Konoha General. For the past week we've had him in a medically-induced coma, from which he was taken out of early today."

"Why did you end the coma?" Homura inquired.

"Any longer and it would prove detrimental for his health."

"And do you know what is causing him to act this way?" Danzo spoke up again, genuinely interested in the proceedings.

"After numerous tests, it's been proven that the cause is a concentration of demonic chakra in his Limbic System, making him excessively aggressive and bloodthirsty to the point where he had to be gagged for biting the finger off of one of the medics while he was performing rounds." Tsunade replied, unsure about the man's intentions. "We've done all we can to remove it, to disperse it, and yet it remains there. Jiraiya himself checked the seal, and found that nothing was wrong. He theorizes that it may simply be an obscure part of the seal activating to allow Naruto to better access and control the Kyuubi's chakra, but doubts it."

"Then what do we do?" Koharu asked of them. "We cannot afford to leave him like this, nor is there an easy solution to this problem."

"Open banishment." Homura's voice cuts through the air, silencing everyone in the room. "We do our best to seal off his chakra. Temporary or permanent, the important thing is that it lasts for some time. We use his condition as an excuse to remove him from the Shinobi ranks, and keep up the story that he's in the South Ward. You, Tsunade, have it set up so that he's isolated, that way no one comes trying to visit him. From what I've heard, Naruto has already done the correct actions required to place him in permanent isolation.

"A team of ANBU is selected to escort Uzumaki, unconscious, on the far edge of the Land of Fire." Homura continued to the group, whom gave him their rapt attention. "He will be given nothing but several scrolls. One explaining his situation, a second one will hold maps of the Elemental Nations, including the locations of the Hidden Villages, with the sole exception of Konoha. The last one is something Hiruzen wanted Naruto to have when he reached 13, and had hoped to bequeath to Naruto personally. It holds an edited account of his mother, telling him everything with the sole exception of his father and her status as the Kyuubi's second Jinchuuriki."

"And how is that a good solution?" Danzo questioned, for once appearing to side with Tsunade, as she also asked that question.

"The open banishment allows us to remove him until such a time that he is back to his former self, when that happens we simply have the Toads summon him-"

"That won't be happening. Jiraiya stated that Naruto's somehow been removed from the contract as their Summoner. He thinks that it may be a part of his condition, but the removal of a Summoner from any of the Summons is unprecedented." Tsunade explained.

"Then we'll have Jiraiya set his spy network to keep tabs upon the boy. When he is mentally sound, we'll send to have him return." Homura finished.

"Keeping tabs on the boy will prove to be a daunting task. Back before he made Genin, he was quite adept at running circles around many of our best in-village Hunter-nin, along with a fair number of our best out-village Hunter-nin." Danzo stated.

"Don't underestimate Jiraiya's network." Tsunade said.

"Don't underestimate the Uzumaki boy." Danzo countered.

"So we are in agreement." Koharu butted in. "Uzumaki Naruto will be removed from the Shinobi ranks and placed into open banishment, with South Ward isolation being the official story."

"Agreed." Homura stated.

"Agreed." Danzo commented.

They looked at Tsunade, who had a clear goal in mind.

"Agreed."

~~***~~

"Oh, Hinata, what are you doing here?" Iruka was on his way to the hospital when he found his former student at the front desk, asking if Naruto had been moved.

"I-I was just ch-checking to see if there was any change in N-Narut-to's location." She meekly replied, and Iruka wondered if the blonde Genin had gained some clue about Hinata's crush on him. Leaving that thought for another time, he simply smiled and asked that she lead the way.

The room was exactly the same, with the sole exception that Naruto's mouth had a gag in it, placed in such a way that it didn't hinder his breathing.

Iruka was shocked to see his favorite former student in such a horrible state, that he immediately ran over to remove the gag, not noticing the red eyes or the hungry look that Naruto was giving him.

He was barely able to dodge Naruto's jaw as it snapped shut where his hand had been not even a second before.

"Naruto, what-" Iruka wasn't able to finish his sentence as he finally noticed the crimson eyes glaring at him.

"Iruka-Sensei!" The smile Naruto was giving him was fundamentally the same as his usual toothy smile, but it was completely different. "Can you please untie me? The doctors here won't accept that I'm _fine._ "

Iruka almost believed it, as that was expected behavior of Naruto, but had enough common sense to give the right answer.

"Sorry Naruto, but you gotta-" Iruka was cut off by Naruto's sudden outburst.

"UNTIE ME YOU SORRY EXCUSE FOR A NINJA!" Naruto screamed, shocking the Chunin, and making Hinata let out a small 'eep!' which brought her to his attention. He immediately went back to his overly polite self, as though the outburst had never happened. "Hinata! I didn't see you there? Can you untie me?" He gave her the sad-eyes, and she almost complied.

Almost.

"I-I apologize, N-Narut-to, b-but-" And then he snapped once more.

"For fucks sake you gods-awful woman, get your pansy ass over here and untie me _right now!_ " His voice didn't rise like before, but it wasn't exactly forthcoming, either. She didn't move from her spot as Iruka started to realize just _why_ Naruto had been gagged. "Did I stutter? No, wait, you'd definitely hear me if I'd stuttered j-just lik-ke you-ou." His voice became horribly mocking, and it brought Hinata to tears.

"Naruto, there's something wrong with you." It was a pure statement of fact, nothing more, nothing less.

"Of course there's something wrong with me. It's that I'm not feeling your heart in my hands as I squeeze the last dregs of life out of it. That I'm not doing my damned best to make that _thing_ next to you beg me to kill it." He started going off on a rant about how unfair it was that they wouldn't let him do as he pleased, and Iruka couldn't take any more of it. He swiftly moved forward, pinning Naruto's head to the bead with his left hand as he reattached the gag with his right.

Iruka left Naruto's room feeling nothing but grief that the child that he'd once taken a liking to had become this monster. With him was an openly sobbing Hyuga Hinata.

That was the last time anyone Naruto knew from Konoha would see him for years.

~~***~~

The banishment itself was a rather silent affair. Tsunade and had injected Naruto with a tranquilizer, so he was sufficiently suited for his banishment.

The ANBU team that had been assembled had been given a backpack holding several days' worth of clothing, some flint, a half-dozen Kunai, a small tarp and the agreed-upon scrolls.

Jiraiya had come and sealed up Naruto's chakra, stating that they should include the information about his chakra being sealed in the explanatory scroll. He'd also said that the seal would only last two, three days max.

And then the time came.

Naruto was slung over the shoulder of one of the ANBU, whose mask looked feline in nature. The man, who had short brown hair, simply nodded to his team, took one last look at the village from the gates, and left.

As they traveled under the moonlight, one of the feline-masked ANBU's subordinates noticed the string of a necklace break as they moved, and picked it up as it fell. The necklace was simple, appearing to be a geometric cylinder of jade between two tiny bells. She pocketed the necklace to give to the Hokage when they returned.

Finally, after several hours of moving as fast as they could, they stopped near the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Wind.

The ANBU who had pocketed the necklace watched as her commander set down the boy and checked to make sure that everything that he was to be left with was in order. She also suspected that he'd marked where they were on the map of the Elemental Nations that the boy was to be left.

A small consolation, it seemed, as soon after they left.

Several hours later, blue eyes opened to view the sky above.


	4. Alone

The sun was shining low in the sky, framing the morning mist beautifully. The mist shimmered in the air, making all the colors appear brighter. The wood of the trees, the leaves on the branches, the dirt on the ground, all of it shined brighter by the mysterious work of the mist and sun. Bird began chirping happily at the sight, greeting the day and their animal neighbors. All of it proved to make a single point.

Today was going to be a beautiful day.

_Bright._

That was the first thing that came to mind for Naruto.

The second thought was _ow._

Thinking hurt, his hearing hurt, everything hurt.

Idly, he figured that this must be what Tsunade feels when she had a 'hangover', and immediately vowed that he would never be loud around her the next time Shizune said she had a hangover.

And then he remembered, and the hangover was gone in an instant.

"No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO!" He cried out, sitting up suddenly. He opened his eyes, and looked around, confused and scared.

He first noticed his clothes, a simple beige t-shirt with dirt-brown pants. On his feet were open-toed boots, which were only the slightest bit big on him. In fact, everything he was wearing was kinda baggy on his lithe frame.

The second thing he noticed was his location. It was a small meadow, surrounded by thick, lush beech trees. The branches arched out, giving the meadow some cover from the elements. In all, it was a perfect spot for anyone to camp out at.

The third and final thing he noticed was the backpack near him, but it was almost ignored when his hangover came back with a vengeance.

"GAHHH!" Was the only thing that he could say as he clutched his head in his hands, pulling on his hair and bending into the fetal position in response to the pain.

He pushed the pain back out of sheer willpower, and was almost too exhausted to crawl over to the backpack and dump its' contents onto the ground.

Inside were several pairs of the same clothes he was wearing, along with an equal number of (Naruto blushed when he noticed) boxers ( _is that silk?_ ). After he forced the clothes back inside the backpack, he found that there was a trio of scrolls, two addressed to him.

He opened the unaddressed one first, finding that it was a map of the elemental nations, with a single mark upon it. It took him a few minutes to make the realization.

That was his location.

The map also showed the locations of important trade routes and the towns they cross through, even going so far as to include the locations of all of the Hidden Villages.

All… with the sole exception of Konoha.

The second scroll he opened had the words 'read me first' printed upon it.

It was a note, and it said this:

_Uzumaki Naruto,_

_Due to the circumstances surrounding your behavior following the failed mission to retrieve Uchiha Sasuke, I, Senju Tsunade, Godaime Hokage of Konohagakure, do hereby remove you from the Shinobi ranks and temporarily banish you from Konohagakure proper. Do not attempt any jutsu, as your chakra has been sealed, though the sealer has stated that it shall only last for several days. This means that you will not be considered a missing-nin, but it does, however, mean that should you approach Konoha before the banishment is lifted, you shall be imprisoned and tried, with the outcome, should you be found guilty, of death._

Naruto thought it was a joke. That they couldn't just leave banish him. Him! Uzumaki Naruto, future Hokage!

But he read on, and it slowly dawned on him that it wasn't a joke.

_I know you won't be happy upon hearing this news, and I know that the outcome of your early return isn't one that I'd ever wish upon you, but your actions have left me with no choice but to condone this solution. I hope you do the right thing and never return to Konoha._

_The banishment shall remain in place until Konoha is in need of your services once more._

In need of- in need of his services! What, did they simply think that he was some kinda tool for them to use at their leisure? He read on, his disbelief growing.

_You have been left with some clothes, a map of the Elemental Nations and scroll that Sarutobi-Sensei had wanted to give to you when you turned thirteen concerning information that he wanted you to know._

It was probably the Old Man's way of telling him about the fox, Naruto snorted. Old Man Sandaime had always preferred not to give bad news in person, and told him so back when Naruto had first been given his apartment. He'd argued that if you weren't there in person to give the bad news, then how could you console them? The Old Man has simply chuckled at Naruto's antics, and replied that the news he had to give wasn't one that could be softened by being there to console them.

Naruto went back to reading.

_Good luck on your journey, I desperately hope you don't hate us by the time I send for you._

_Senju Tsunade_

_Densetsu no Sannin_

_Godaime Hokage, Konohagakure no Sato_

 ~~***~~

"Lady Hokage, the mission you've set us out on has been completed." Tora, the ANBU who had carried Naruto to the edge of the Land of Fire, reported.

Tsunade nodded, and dismissed all but Tora, so that he could debrief her on the details. Neko, however, stayed.

"Is there a reason you've not left, Neko?" Tora inquired, sounding as though he was using his 'spook face'. Neko stood firm and inclined her head in the affirmative.

"Now, now, Tenzo. You both are standing in my presence, so you don't have to refer to each other by your codenames right now." Tsunade said, looking from one to the other as they removed their masks. "So, what do you have to report Yugao?"

The purple-haired woman stepped forward, giving a small bow of respect before starting.

"During the transport, this," She held out the necklace. "Fell from the cargo."

It was a testament to Yugao's professionalism that she was able to talk about an actual person as though they were an object.

Tsunade looked at the object Yugao handed out, and her breath caught in her throat.

 _The necklace._ She thought, dreading what it meant for Naruto. The last time it had returned to her possession, Dan had died right in front of her eyes.

She reached out and grabbed the necklace, thanking Yugao before putting in on once more.

_Did I do the right thing?_

~~***~~ 

Naruto had spent the better part of an hour ranting to himself about the unjustness of it all. Then he packed up everything, taking note of what wasn't mentioned in the scroll.

He had a half-dozen Kunai, several yards of ninja wire and an equal length of rope, flint and a canteen full of water.

A search of the area revealed the existence of a river a several meters from the meadow. He'd have searched further, but without his chakra to bolster his stamina, he couldn't travel further than roughly half a kilometer before he started to feel exhausted.

 _Is this how the civilians feel when they try to do what ninja do?_ Naruto wondered as he collapsed back into the clearing after having run there from the river, gasping for breath. He'd tried to catch a fish, but hadn't succeeded, and now was paying the price of having overdone it. _I'll definitely be more careful with my chakra when I get it back, if this is what it feels like to be a civilian._

Lying down, Naruto took a moment to get his breath back, and took stock of his unearthly stamina that he had taken for granted.

After a few minutes, Naruto had gotten his second wind, and was more careful with it now that he'd known what would happen if it was wasted like the first time. He took two of the Kunai, pocketed them, adjusted them so that they wouldn't cut off his bits if he made the wrong move, and walked around the perimeter of the clearing, picking up stray twigs, even occasionally breaking some of the lower-hanging branches off of the trees.

Soon, he had a good enough pile to start a small fire, for when it came time to do so, and placed them back near the backpack.

He then started to dig a small pit in the middle of the clearing with one of the Kunai, making a depression about a foot deep and two around. He lined the depression with rocks a little bigger than his fist, officially marking the depression as a fire pit. He stood up, stretching his back out to diffuse the pain of having been in a stooping position for just over an hour, when his stomach rumbled, loud and hard.

Looking down in shock at the sound, Naruto suddenly realized just how hungry he was, and swore that he could _feel_ his stomach shrink in on itself, and the empty pit that it left in his body because of that was most unsettling.

Taking a look at the Sun's position in the sky, he figured it was almost noon, and decided to try his hand at catching a fish.

~~***~~

Standing at the edge of the river with a Kunai in hand, he made the cross-shaped handsign and made to pull on his chakra.

Only for nothing to happen.

 _Oh, right. No chakra, no jutsu._ Naruto embarrassedly (and soberly) thought, as he began to rethink his plan to catch lunch.

And so, Naruto found himself standing in the middle of the river an hour later. A test of patience, something he'd quickly found himself lacking. And yet, as he stood there, he couldn't help but reach an almost Zen-like state of mind, in doing so nearly missed the Halibut that was swimming towards him.

His arm went up.

He struck.

The fish scattered at the sudden intrusion, and the Halibut was grazed by Naruto's fingers as they attempted to snatch it.

"Dammit." He muttered, as a hunger cramp struck.

Now he had to wait another hour. His stomach loudly grumbled in protest.

~~***~~

It was around two in the afternoon when Naruto finally caught several good-sized Trout. He strung them up and brought them back to his camp, tired and hungry as hell, but smiling up a storm.

Once he made it back to camp, he moved to simply set the string of fish down, before frowning. He didn't want to have to trek back to the river to clean up the fish before frying them, nor did he want to waste the water in his canteen. Looking around, he suddenly remembered one of the lessons they taught at the Academy. Back before he'd taken the Genin test the first time, there had been a wilderness survival class, and one of the things it taught was how to set your food so that forest predators couldn't get at it. Glancing at the trees around him, he found a branch about 15 feet up that looked strong enough for his needs.

Tying the end of the rope to a Kunai, Naruto tossed in the air, where it flew above the branch before coming down the other side. Jumping up and snagging the Kunai out of the air, he started pulling on the rope, hoisting the fish string up about 10 feet before tying the end off at the base of the tree. Satisfied, Naruto gave himself a small nod of approval before setting about building the fire.

_~~***~~_

_Why on earth didn't they leave me a damn 1_ _st_ _aid kit?_ Naruto thought and grumbled angrily, digging through the pockets of the backpack with his left hand. He'd accidentally burned his right hand when the fire had suddenly picked right up, the flames hitting three of his fingers and the back of his hand, which was currently wrapped in the excess of his shirt. Finally, he found a small first aid kit in a side pocket, letting out a small "Ahah!" of joy, he set about finding the burn cream.

Once his hand had some cream on it, with a light wrapping of gauze to keep it from getting inflamed worse than it was, he lowered the fish, undid one of the 5-pounders he'd gotten, then raised the fish back up where he'd left them before beheading and skinning the one he'd taken down for lunch. Skewering the fish, he held it close to the fire to cook quickly, keeping a sharp eye on it.

To Naruto, fish had never tasted so delicious.

The rest of the day had been fairly slow, with Naruto resting up before eating dinner.

He never knew just how much of a ninja's stamina came from their chakra, but that day was a startling reminder of just how big the difference between a civilian and a Shinobi was.

Naruto was humbled at how big a gap it was, and was thankful that the Academy had also worked on physical development as well as chakra development, otherwise he might've been screwed in setting up his encampment.

Getting up all his muscles started burning in pain, and the burn of his hand flared up. The combined pain nearly sent him into unconsciousness, but it wasn't as bad as the pain he'd had that morning. Thankfully, his body had gotten used to working without his chakra rather quickly, or else he'd still be in the fetal position moaning in pain.

Stretching, Naruto stopped when it made the pain worse. Groaning, he shuffled over to the rope, letting the fish string down again as the Sun went down. Picking the lone 7-pounder out of the five remaining fish, Naruto set it aside as he pulled the fish string back up the tree, feeling a twinge of pain each time his right hand took hold of the rope and pulled.

~~***~~

After eating dinner, Naruto sat down, looking at the map of the Elemental Nations he'd been left. Noting his position, he figured that if he went east, he'd pass through the Land of Birds and enter the Land of Wind. Hopefully, he'd then find a Suna-nin that was returning to Sunagakure, and follow them. From there, he'd locate Gaara and figure out his plan from there.

Nodding to himself at the ingeniousness of it all, he put out the fire, letting the clearing only be lit by the low light of the moon, before laying his head upon the backpack and going to sleep.

~~***~~

The wolves moved swiftly, the smell of rotting fish guiding them towards their destination. Nothing would stop them from getting their meal.

Nothing.

~~***~~

It was the howling that woke Naruto up. And it was the barking, the unstopping barking, that made him start to panic.

Wolves? He had no chakra, so it was kinda pointless to scare them off. But… if he could fight them, drive them away, then they wouldn't return, which was better than simply scaring them off.

He sat up, pulling out a pair of Kunai and holding them in a reverse grip in both hands.

 _Let them come. I'll fight them off._ He arrogantly thought. _I hope._

The howling and barking came closer and closer, the noises sounding more and more vicious and euphoric.

And then they stopped.

The silence filled the air, and all that could be heard was Naruto's heavy breathing. There was a slight shuffling sound as Naruto turned his head and torso around, trying to find where the wolves would first strike. He froze before twisting around, the Kunai in his hand making a slight whistle in the air as he swung his arm around him, hitting nothing but air. His breathing became heavier, more ragged. If anyone could see him, they'd find his eyes darting around, his demeanor becoming frantic.

And the wolves struck.

Naruto was hit from the left, feeling teeth brush past his arm, hearing the _snap_ the jaw made as it clamped shut, missing his arm by mere hairs. He twisted his arm to strike as the wolf's strike had knocked him to the ground, but was met with claws that held his arm down as Naruto felt hot breath descend upon his arm. Reacting the fastest he'd been since he'd woken up, Naruto slammed the butt of the Kunai in his right hand into the face of the wolf that was about to devour his left arm.

The wolf shrunk back from the blow, though not by much, but it had been enough for Naruto to pull his arm out from under the wolf's forepaws, garnering several gashes for his effort.

He went up on one knee, panting from the effort, as the other wolves descended upon the encampment.

"Shit." Naruto ground out.

~~***~~

The first attack set the mood for the entire affair.

Naruto was blindsided by two as the rest ransacked the encampment, digging up the fish heads and skin he'd buried before ravaging them into nothing.

Naruto swung, hitting home with the shoulder of one of the wolves, sending it limping back, and was immediately set upon by two more in its' wake. They ripped into him, and he was barely able to hold his own. Every injury he made on them, they doubled on him, until he was bleeding and backed into the tree that held the string of fish.

As the pack moved to finish Naruto off, he undid the knot keeping the fish string in the air, letting the half-dozen fall to the ground amidst the wolf pack, which quickly forgot about Naruto.

He grabbed the backpack, which had a few holes in it but was pretty much intact along with everything in it, and crawled away.

He crawled, and kept crawling until the wolf pack had become snarls in the distance.

And then he collapsed on the ground, sobbing.

He was well and truly alone here, with no help coming.

And Konoha had left him here to die.

He fell asleep crying, the snarling of the wolves becoming dimmer and dimmer as the night progressed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so many scene breaks.


	5. The Land of Birds

Naruto woke up in the middle of a forest; his face covered with dirt, dried blood and streaked with clear lines signifying the tracks his tears had taken to the ground.

He sat up, and immediately began to regret it. All across his body were bruises from being thrown around, cuts where the wolves had latched onto him with the claws on their paws, and gashes from the few times that the beasts had bitten him. Reaching into the backpack, which he'd clearly taken as a makeshift pillow, if the dark spots where his eyes had been was any indication, Naruto pulled out the 1st aid kit.

He began sloppily placing antiseptic on all the wounds, hissing at the pain of the sterilization, before applying healing cream and doing his best to cover the wounds with all of his bandages and gauze.

Naruto missed the way he'd always healed fast, and immediately a glimpse of a memory, one where his Jonin-Sensei had bandaged his hand after he'd stabbed his hand with a Kunai to draw out the poison, flashed through his mind.

And Naruto was crying once more, wishing for his life back. Wishing that he was back in Konoha, having lunch with Iruka while recounting his day of training and D-Rank missions. Wishing that he was in the Hokage's office, being scolded by a drunken Tsunade for interrupting her while she was getting the day's filing done.

But he couldn't be there. He wasn't there.

Because they'd banished him.

And the tears flowed anew as Naruto laid on the ground, holding his knees close with his arms, and cried into them.

~~***~~

"Excuse me, but could you please tell me where Uzumaki Naruto's room is, I stopped by the room he was in before, but it was empty." Iruka asked the receptionist at the desk. Even though he'd had to stay with Hinata for the past day, and even called upon her team and cousin to comfort the girl who'd been belittled by her soon-to-be ex-crush, Iruka would still visit Naruto, if only to remind himself of the boy he once knew, who had disappeared at the end of his last mission and left that _thing_ behind. It hurt to think in those kinds of terms, to call Naruto a thing, but there was no other way to describe him.

Iruka had extended the offer to join him in visiting Naruto, but all of his friends had declined. It appeared that they had been hurt by Naruto just like Hinata, and could not bring themselves to face him again.

"Yes, he's been moved into permanent isolation in the South Ward. No visitors." The receptionist told the kind-hearted Chunin.

"What? Why?" Iruka started to panic inside. _What did that thing do?_ Was the painful thought going through his mind.

"Uzumaki had been attacking everyone he saw. One doctor even had to have surgery to reattach one of his fingers along with part of his hand. It was concluded that it was all the nonessential personnel he'd regularly come into contact with that was making him so dangerous, and the Godaime herself approved his move into the isolation hall of the South Ward."

 _The Godaime herself approved this?_ If Iruka was shocked at the isolation, he was floored by the fact that Tsunade, who was practically a mother-figure to Naruto, had condoned his isolation. _Though perhaps it was_ _ **because**_ _she's like his mother that she did this?_

All Iruka knew was that he now had to seek audience with the Godaime, and find out if she put Naruto in isolation for his own safety, or for the safety of others?

~~***~~

Naruto cried until he couldn't cry anymore. And then he simply lay there, feeling nothing but the slowly dimming pain of his wounds. One thought kept running through his mind, repeating itself like some kind of perverse mantra, never letting it get forgotten to something- anything else.

_They left me._

Konoha had abandoned him. His friends, the ones he'd alienated, had left him.

He remembered everything. Every word, every action, everything.

And he had no regrets about anything he said. No remorse, nothing. He tried to feel _some_ thing for alienating his friends like that, but no matter what he did, he simply felt nothing.

Naruto didn't notice when he'd fallen back asleep, nor did he stir when a shadow moved over his form.

 ~~***~~

"Why did you lock up Naruto?" Iruka cut straight to the matter at hand. He knew that simply ignoring all pretenses would be immensely disrespectful, but there was a time and a place for such niceties, and this situation was neither the time nor the place.

Not when it involved Naruto.

"He attacked anyone who he came into contact with, verbally and, when he could, physically. The sensible decision was to limit all contact with the outside world." Tsunade explained, and Iruka had the faintest of impressions that it was rehearsed, but tossed it aside as one of those things medical professionals do.

"That's not what I meant, and you know it." It isn't that Iruka doesn't respect the position of Hokage or those that hold it, simply that his fondness for the lovable blonde went further than his sense of duty and honor.

Tsunade sighs, as if she expected this, and he has to wonder if the Godaime had expected something like this to happen.

"Umino-"

"Please call me Iruka, lady Hokage." His curt interruption made for a split second of awkward silence before she continued as though there was not interruption at all.

"Iruka," She began again, fixing him with a stern look. "I would not lock Naruto away if I didn't think it was just as much for his safety as the safety of the public, but in this case, they are one and the same. Naruto's become too dangerous to be around just anyone, and his behavior hasn't helped. If anything, it's made it all the more clear that he needs the isolation more than anything else."

This gave Iruka pause, as he hadn't expected such an answer, but the idea seemed unbelievable in his mind. Naruto being locked up for his own sake as well as the sake of the villagers? Why- oh, right.

While the public that knew of Naruto's Jinchuuriki status did not like him, nor did they act against him. Iruka heard that Naruto hadn't really been treated any better than the other orphans, but that didn't mean that he had been treated any worse than the others. And it was really only the parents fearing for their children's safety that they didn't let him play with others his age.

The most they had done was treat him with indifference, to the point where it had appeared that everyone hated him.

Iruka nodded.

"Do you visit him regularly?" The question wasn't all the surprising to Tsunade, and she nodded, making sure he saw the nonverbal answer. "Then if you could please tell him that I'm there for him, even if I can't be there in person."

He sounded so desperate that she had no choice but to answer in the affirmative.

In a side drawer of the Hokage's desk, there sat a necklace of a geometric jade cylinder with tiny bells on either side of it. It lay atop a worn-out Hitai-Ate.

Both were waiting for their wielder to return home.

~~***~~

When Naruto woke up, the first thing he noticed was that he was in a large cave.

The second thing he noticed was that he hadn't brought himself there.

The third thing he noticed was that his wounds had been treated, and he was now in a fresh pair of clothes, identical to the previous pair.

"So you are awake, then?" It wasn't voiced as a question, and Naruto didn't think that the gruff voice had meant it to be one. He looked around before setting his eyes upon a small fire burning nearby ( _how had he not noticed it immediately? He was, like, three feet from it!_ ) And the hunched form of a person on the opposite him.

"Yes." Naruto then clutched his throat. His voice- it had always been rather rough from having spent all that time yelling at anyone and everyone who would listen, but now it was different. A little deeper (only barely, he sadly noted) but definitely smoother now. "Did you carry me here?"

His voice wasn't all that different, he noted. Fundamentally, he sounded the same, with the exception that it was as though he'd taken a cough drop.

"Not exactly." Was all that the mysterious person replied, and Naruto waited several seconds in silence before realizing that the person wasn't going to say anything else. Naruto sat there in silence with the person, silently rejoicing in the company of another human being, before curiosity got the better of him, making him fidget until he worked up the courage to speak again.

"Um, thanks for saving me, I guess." Boy, this was awkward, Naruto thought, as he tried to thank the man. "My name's Naruto, by the way."

The man shuffled into the light of the fire better, and Naruto's breath caught as he was met with the sight of a cloak.

The black cloak.

Dotted with red clouds.

The man set his dead eyes on Naruto, his dark, wood-like skin reflecting slightly in the glow of the fire.

"My name is Akasuna no Sasori, Kyuubi Jinchuuriki."

~~***~~

Naruto quickly took hold of the situation, moving to grab his backpack, which he immediately shouldered and ran for the mouth of the cave, only to be stopped by a giant, segmented chain-like thing that, Naruto saw with growing horror, had come _from the Akatsuki member himself_.

"Now where are you going so fast, Jinchuuriki." Sasori spoke. "It is quite rude for one to give their full name and another to simply avoid such niceties. So, if you would please tell me you full name."

"Uzumaki Naruto, former Genin of Konohagakure." He couldn't do anything. He had no chakra, all the Kunai were in the backpack, if Sasori hadn't already noticed and removed them. But he'd be damned if he didn't put up a fight, no matter how pointless it would be.

"It seems you misunderstand, that title was not the one I wanted to hear. Tell me what you _really_ are before I contact my partner to kill you." Sasori's face didn't so much as bat an eye when Naruto had begun to slip into a basic Taijutsu stance. Naruto's throat felt dry at the reminder that there was a second S-Class ninja close by, prepared for his escape. He gulped his spit, trying to wet his throat to be able to talk, and began to speak, his usual cocky tone nonexistent.

"Uzumaki Naruto, Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi no Kitsune- the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox." He sounded so _scared._ Sasori chuckled, a grating sound that was not dissimilar to the noise that one makes when they drag a piece of metal across concrete.

"Good." He said. "I just wanted you to confirm it yourself before I took you down. After all, Leader would be _very_ unhappy if I brought in the wrong person."

And Naruto took it as the best time to make his move.

He knew that attaining the mark of S-Class meant that you were one of a select few who were the deadliest in all of the Elemental Nations; that you could take on anyone and come out on top. The only ones that could ostensibly take on an S-Class ninja was another S-Class ninja or a Kage, and even then it was unknown just who would win.

Naruto was neither S-Class caliber nor a Kage.

Nor did he have any chakra to call upon.

But that didn't mean that he wasn't gonna go down fighting.

Naruto flew forward, sliding across the clacking tail-thing that had moved to intercept him, ducked down as a hail of senbon were shot out of Sasori's mouth, obliterating the cloth that hid it from view.

Naruto thought that he'd seen some pretty freaked out things in his short time as a ninja, from Orochimaru shedding his skin to Kabuto coming back to life after having his guts turned to dust by Naruto's own hand, but they didn't- _couldn't_ really compare to Sasori, as he found out.

Sasori's left hand shot out, the blunt wooden hand-thing slamming into Naruto, who was propelled further by the sudden explosion of the fingers, launching him into the side of the cave and cracking his already bruised ribs. Naruto got up, clutching his side and coughing up blood. He reached into the backpack, and was overjoyed at finding the Kunai where'd he'd left them. Thank god for small mercies.

Holding two between his knuckles like claws, he staggered forward towards Sasori, deflecting the tip of the tail, causing the rest of it to follow as it stuck itself in the ground to the side of Naruto.

Sasori tried to yank the tail back towards him, but it didn't respond. Looking at it, he was angered to find that it had been taken down by a single Kunai that had been jammed into the mechanism near the body. He growled and removed the Akatsuki cloak, revealing the true form of his outer shell to Naruto, who was much too close for comfort.

Sending out chakra strings, he'd been momentarily shocked to find that they hadn't taken hold, as if the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki had no chakra. That moment had been all Naruto had needed to slam the remaining Kunai in his hand as deep into what he thought had been Sasori's head.

And then the chakra strings had taken hold, and Naruto was flung back.

"Heh, guess you Akatsuki dudes aren't as powerful as you think you are." He smiled and stood up, before grimacing and clutching at his now-broken ribs in pain.

"Damn." The voice made Naruto stop, his eyes wide with fear. He turned towards the 'dead' Sasori, only to watch in horror as a red-headed teen stood up, standing in what Naruto now knew was nothing more than a shell of some kind. "You took down Hiruko. I should be impressed by your skill if I didn't know for a fact that you were about to die."

The voice was impossibly smoother, but Naruto couldn't mistake it for anyone else.

The person standing before him was Akasuna no Sasori, alive, uninjured and quite unhappy.

"Wh-what are you?" Naruto was frozen in fear.

"I already told you. I am Akasuna no Sasori, the greatest puppet master since Chikamatsu Monzaemon." Sasori looked at Naruto. "Tell me, did you really believe to have killed me?"

Naruto said nothing, as fear dominated his body. He was _so scared._ And he was about to die.

He felt some kind of pressure come from inside of his body, pushing against some kind of barrier, and for a second Naruto was scared that it was Kyuubi, using this as the perfect time to turn him back into that bastard-y person again. But then he realized that if it really was Kyuubi, then it would feel like a fire, comforting and burning his body simultaneously. This instead felt warm and comforting, like it was something that he'd always had with him, bringing him comforting warmth in the coldest of nights, and cooling him down on the hottest of days. Naruto let it come forth.

There was what felt like some sort of wall crumbling, and the barrier shattered.

The seal had broken.

Naruto's chakra had returned to him.

And with it, his unwavering confidence.

"For a second there, yeah, I kinda did." Naruto's trademark smirk was back in place, and he flexed his fingers, feeling his chakra flow throughout his entire body and fill it with the life he hadn't noticed was missing. "But now I'm gonna make sure that you're dead as dust when I'm through with you."

"And how do you propose to do that?" Sasori was reaching into his cloak and removing a scroll from it. "After all, you have shown that your skills are not worthy of combating my favorite puppet, and you appear to have had your chakra sealed."

"Don't underestimate me." Naruto growled, a bit of his old scruffy voice showing through with that single comment. He moved his hands into the familiar cross-shaped handsign, and brought forth just enough chakra for a half-dozen clones.

Normally, he'd call forth an army, but the loss of his chakra had left a lasting impact on him, making him more conservative in terms of chakra usage.

A half-dozen Shadow Clones popped into existence, dividing into groups of two. One from each pair held their right hand out to the side, while the remaining three started moving their hands, aiding in the creation of three individual Rasengan.

Sasori simply stared, his eyes half-lidded. He cocked his head slightly, letting his interest in the mechanics of such a jutsu show on his (albeit) emotionless face.

"An interesting jutsu, but not one that will help you against me." Sasori summoned several puppets and sent them after all the six identical blonde teens rushing towards him.

The three without Rasengans were taken out quite easily, and disappeared in bursts of smoke, but the remaining three were able to dispatch of three puppets before being taken down with non-fatal wounds meant to incapacitate, as Sasori believed that the real one was among them.

And then all three dispersed into smoke, and Sasori was left in the cave with nothing to show for his attempt at capturing a Jinchuuriki except for four damaged puppets and a broken ego.

Deidara wasn't gonna drop this failure anytime soon.

If Sasori was still human, his one eye would be twitching like mad.

~~***~~

Naruto ran, and kept running, west. He didn't stop for several hours, and when he did, it was nearing dusk, and he'd come upon a small town.

Panting, and, he was very glad to note, only slightly winded, he went to the nearest house and knocked on the door.

The last thing he saw before passing out from his injuries was the face of a red-headed girl a little older than him.

When Naruto next woke up, he was shirtless and had a doctor checking over his once-broken ribs.

Hirako Shinji, as the doctor was called, was quite odd-looking, in Naruto's opinion. He had teal hair in a bowl-cut, and his face reminded Naruto of a goat, for some reason.

"Well, I don't know how, but you're almost completely healed." Shinji said as he got up. Looking down at Naruto, Shinji left him with these parting words. "At the rate you're healing, you're free to be on your way by this afternoon."

"Wait." Naruto called out, still tired from all he'd been through. "How long have I been out?"

"All night. You're really very lucky you'd knocked on Lisa's door, if it had been my house you'd probably still be laying out there." Shinji chuckled to himself as he left the room, leaving Naruto with more questions than answers.

_Who's Lisa?_

 ~~***~~

Yadomaru Lisa, it turned out was the red-headed girl he'd seen just before collapsing. She had short hair, which she'd apparently just dyed red when Naruto had appeared on her doorstep, and wore wire-frame glasses over violet-grey eyes. She was quite uptight, as Naruto soon found out when he thanked her for taking him in and calling Shinji.

"I was simply doing what was needed of me, now get healing and remove yourself from my life once you're done." Was her response. He'd laughed, and then offered to help her however he could.

She'd kicked him in the face.

The day had come and gone quickly, and Naruto had decided to leave in the morning. He and Lisa had gone over to Shinji's house for dinner, sashimi and rice, which Naruto took to like it was the most delicious thing in the world, confusing Shinji, Lisa and Shinji's daughter, a spunky blonde much like Naruto named Hiyori.

They'd had lots of fun, talking about anything and everything, from Shinji explaining the more hilarious exploits of Hiyori trying to attack him whenever he came home to Naruto's prankster exploits back in Konoha.

He was surprised to find that, while there was a part of his heart ached when he started talking about the village that had abandoned him, it wasn't as much as it when he'd crawled away from the wolves.

 ~~***~~

The Sun lazily appeared in the sky, and it came time for Naruto to be on his way. Lisa, Shinji, Hiyori appeared to see him off, wishing him the best of luck in his journey.

"Here." Shinji held out a pouch.

"What is it?" Naruto asked as he took the pouch and affixed in upon the waist of his pants.

"It's the basic med-kit that all medic-nin have with them. Since the Land of Birds doesn't have a ninja village to call its' own, the villages have to make do themselves, and prefer not to call upon the aid of the ninja of Suna and Konoha whenever they can. This means that we have to be as self-sufficient as possible, and you'd be surprised at how important these things can be to us, especially in times of war." Shinji explained, and Naruto nodded his head, the patience he'd gained from catching fish by hand making him better at listening to others.

Hiyori gave Naruto enough jerky to survive a round-trip trek from Kumo to Suna, and Lisa gave him a book on the Elemental Nations, which surprised him. He hadn't thought that they really hit it off during his stay there, but he'd been wrong.

"Thanks guys, for everything." He just wasn't sure how to properly express his happiness towards them, and Shinji seemed to notice it. Giving Naruto another of his odd smiles ( _He looks like a goat so much it's not funny_ ) they bade Naruto a safe journey to Sunagakure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This won't be a crossover with Bleach. Just needed some background characters and they filled it out.


	6. Sunagakure

Contrary to popular belief, the Land of Wind was not, in fact, "one big desert", as a rather idiotic person said it was.

That person also said such idiotic comments like there being no land routes anywhere in the Land of Water, the Lands of Lightning and Earth being entirely made of mountains, and the Land of Fire being a thick forest.

That person, Jiraiya of the Sannin, had lived to regret his idiocy in the many years since having answered that question in his academy days.

For instance, he hadn't really bothered to learn about the smaller countries, the ones without Hidden Villages. Foregoing such knowledge, he'd instead preferred to have his contacts, the real spies among his network, deal with those kinds of things, and instead wanted regular information on the five Hidden Villages, including the three (now four) lesser villages, Kusa, Taki, Ame and Oto.

And it was for that reason the Uzumaki Naruto disappeared off the face of the earth, and he now had to figure out just what to say to Tsunade, who had asked him to provide her with regular updates on how Naruto was fairing out in the world. He thought that it would be rather easy; the gaki, having been left near an often-used trade route, would hitch a ride to the nearest town, where Jiraiya was waiting in disguise and would watch Naruto's actions, indirectly interfering if the situation called for it.

But then two days had passed, and several caravans had come and gone via the route, and none of them had Naruto with them, or reported seeing a small blonde-haired boy with whisker-birthmarks.

At the end of the second day, Jiraiya had to exercise self-restraint in going to make sure Naruto was okay, instead sending one of his messenger toads to spy on Naruto, and thinking that there wasn't _that_ big of a difference between a civilian and a Genin, stamina-wise.

Oh, if he only knew.

~~***~~

"What do you mean, you can't find him?" Tsunade's angry, strained voice hits him almost as bad a one of her punches, and he flinches back as though she _had_ hit him.

"I mean, he wasn't found by any of the caravans, and when I went to see where he'd been left, it was home to a wolf pack." Tsunade looked tired, and stressed beyond belief. "There were obvious signs that he'd stayed there. In the middle of the clearing was a fire pit, and the wolves appeared to have dug up the remains of several fish. Looked like the gaki had gone fishing, by hand probably, and the smell of the fish attracted the wolves.

"I tried to find him, but there wasn't anything that _could_ be tracked. The toads can't track by scent, he's left nothing to indicate where he's gone and having his chakra sealed makes it impossible to find him through that means. I hate to say it, but it appears that the gaki has gone off the grid, however intentional or not it was."

Tsunade got out of her seat, went around the desk and clutched Jiraiya's vest in both hands, lifting him off of the ground.

"Then find him. I want to know everything, where he is, what he's doing, who he's with. _Everything._ " She growled; her eyes red with tears unshed.

~~***~~

The Sun beat down hard upon Naruto, and he looked around him, finding that it was only slightly cooler in the shadow of the patch of forest he was in. Pulling out the map, he looked over it, judging how far he'd traveled in the past week.

It had been a week since he'd left the small town of Karakura in the Land of Birds, and since then he'd been running non-stop, using the Sun's location to head in the right direction. He hoped.

Looking down at the map of the Land of Wind, he found that he should have reached Sunagakure by now, given its location relative to Karakura.

Back when he'd first entered the Land of Wind, he'd gone through an odd border town, the kind where you would expect the most unsavory of characters to use to cross borders undetected. In fact, he'd been checked through by a strange man, rather tall and slender. Otoribashi Rojuro, or Rose, had wavy blonde hair similar in color to Naruto's, which brought out the purple in his eyes, Naruto was slightly freaked out to have noticed ( _does this mean I'm gay?_ ), while Rose had simply smiled and said that he had an appearance that made all people question their sexuality ( _How'd he know what I was thinking?_ ) before sending Naruto on his way to verify his newly minted passport with- Naruto looked at the note he was given- Urahara Kisuke.

Urahara made Rose seem normal, Naruto idly noted, as his mind had all but shut down once he'd met the guy in charge of verifying passports. He wore a dark green shirt with matching shorts, a green-and-white bucket hat over his short pale-blonde hair, geta and a black coat with a white diamond pattern on the bottom. However, that was probably the most normal thing about him.

He carried around a cane for no reason that Naruto could see, as he darted about his office without so much as a hint of a limp, and kept asking Naruto the oddest of questions ("What's your favorite day of the week?" "Do you prefer dogs or cats?" "What word do you think is the funniest to say?" "What's your favorite hour of the day?") And didn't really give Naruto a chance to answer any of them.

And if that didn't cement that this Urahara guy was insane, then the fact that he'd introduced Naruto to his best friend ( _A black cat?_ ) sent him over the top, in Naruto's opinion.

The second Naruto had his passport stamped and approved he shouldered his pack, made sure he had everything he needed on him, and started running the second he had a good hold on the passport. He hadn't really stopped running since.

And now he was lost. _Great._ He thought. _Now what am I gonna do?_

 ~~***~~

Gaara had been sent to perform a once-ever of the forest outside of Suna, and hadn't expected to find anything.

If he was to be completely honest (which, he figured, he was) with anyone who asked, he would answer that he rather liked border patrol. The quiet was a big difference in comparison to the people all muttering about him. He'd never really liked being around other people, as it had made the crazed mutterings of the Tanuki within him turn into blood-crazed screams to kill them all.

And so, Baki, as acting Kazekage until either a proper one could be found or the council voted him the Godaime, sent Gaara on city border patrol. So far, he hadn't run into anybody, and was descending into a state of mind he had never been in. _Is this what they mean when they say that they feel Zen?_ Were some of the thoughts that ran through his mind as he considered the oddity that was this calm. Even the Tanuki was being rather silent, which would normally have made him freak out, but the Zen mind he believed himself to be in made him simply choose to… enjoy it. A look of peace adorned Gaara's face as he slowly walked along the ground, under the shade of the forest.

And then someone nearby started cursing, and Gaara's moment of Zen was gone.

~~***~~

Naruto looked at the map, and by his calculations, he should be in the middle of Suna.

"Damn it!" He cried out, before turning that single sentence into a mantra. The mantra continued until he was picked up and thrown into a tree.

Sand curled around him, pinning him to the tree, and would have crushed him had he not realized just who had found him.

"Who are you and why have you interrupted my 'Zen'?" Gaara sounded somewhat unsure about it actually being Zen, and his uncertainty showed.

"Gaara?" Naruto appeared jubilant, before what Gaara said sank in. He quirked an eyebrow and said, quite disbelievingly, "Did you say 'Zen'?"

"Uzumaki." Gaara regarded, and the sand returned to his gourd. "To answer your question, I was feeling exceedingly... peaceful, I think, is the correct term for it, before you made your presence known. Now tell me, why are you here."

Naruto paused, trying to find the logic in Gaara being Zen, failing, and finally answering by handing Gaara the scroll written by Tsunade.

Gaara stared at the scroll, before Naruto prompted him to open and read it. His eyes narrowed, and Naruto had to physically stop him from going to the Acting Kazekage and requesting that he be sent back to Konoha.

Gaara simply responded that it was rather stupid to have banished their strongest ninja, to which Naruto sighed and explained just were he ranked in power. Gaara had appeared confused, at least Naruto _hoped_ that it was confused on his face, and not him about to go batshit again. He almost said as much, but decided not to.

Sometimes it was better not to say anything than be completely open and honest with someone.

Especially when that someone could kill you into dust, literally, without batting an eye. He sighed.

_This is going to be a long day._

 ~~***~~

Jiraiya stood at the passport verification process in Karakura, dodging all sorts of strange questions from the pale-blonde man in front of him.

At first, he'd simply been trying to get his passport stamped so he could enter the country, but he'd hit a bit of a snag with the crazy pale-blonde-haired man in front of him. After answering all the questions he could, he was about to get his passport stamped when the man had made the connection that he wrote the Icha Icha series.

The man then went and announced it on the PA system.

Apparently, a _lot_ of the people there were big fans, and bullied him into autographing anything and everything that they could get signed. And he meant _everything._ He shuddered.

Sometimes, he hated being the writer of a famed series.

~~***~~

"Hey, Gaara, could you not tell anyone I'm here?" Naruto's smooth voice cut through the air as he and Gaara walked back to Suna.

"Why?"

"Because I'm not sure if Konoha has warned the Kazekage about me." Gaara looked at Naruto.

"I am sure that whatever you did was not so bad that the entire Elemental Nations would be after you." Gaara's reply was swift and filled with somewhat flawed logic.

"I know, but… Have you ever heard of the Akatsuki?" Naruto stopped with Gaara and looked at his auburn-haired friend.

"I have not."

"Well, they're this group of S-Class ninja, and they're after us!" Gaara's head tilted slightly.

"Us?"

"What we hold." Naruto could not have been clearer.

"I was not under the impression that we 'held' anything." Naruto's eye started twitching. _Has he never heard of subtle?_

And then he remembered who he was talking to, and sighed.

"You have the Ichibi no Shukaku sealed within you. I have the Kyuubi no Kitsune sealed within me." Gaara's eyes widened, and something akin to panic spread throughout his entire being. The Tanuki inside him had gone deathly silent, and this time Gaara didn't know if it was good or bad that such a thing had happened. "And the Akatsuki want to take them from us."

"That does not sound good." Gaara stated in his usual blunt demeanor. "And you are sure that they are after us?"

"Positive." Naruto confirmed with a grim look upon his face. "I got abducted by one of them back in the Land of Birds. His name was- oh, what was it? It was like a kind of insect… Sasori! That was his name! Akasuna no Sasori."

"I have heard that name before. Kankuro has expressly stated that this Sasori is the greatest puppet master to have ever existed, and hopes to one day surpass him in the puppet arts." Gaara responds. "I assume that there are others in this Akatsuki?"

"Yeah, at least two others, a tall fish-man from Kiri. Kisame, I think his name is. And Uchiha Itachi, Sasuke's older brother." Naruto answers, then looks at Gaara. "You said your brother knows this Sasori. Think he can tell us?"

Gaara paused, and then continued back to Suna, Naruto following behind him.

"As you have stated I have people who wish to protect me, and since our battle I have been trying to… make it up to them, I believe is the phrase." Gaara took a second to find the right words to best explain to the upbeat- wait. Gaara made the sudden realization that Uzumaki Naruto was not the same person he had fought months ago. Thinking over previous encounters with Uzumaki, Gaara had come to know the blonde as loud, brash, open and prone to acting before thinking. Now, however, the Uzumaki Naruto he had been talking to was almost counterpoint to the Uzumaki he knew: calm, quieter, closed off ( _though not too much_ ), and appeared to be thinking before acting.

Naruto looked at Gaara, trying to get the attention of the ( _hopefully_ ) reformed psychopath in the best way that wouldn't end with his life in danger.

In short, he was asking Gaara why he'd stopped walking and was just staring out into space.

Gaara snapped back to reality and chose to ignore Naruto's incessant questioning of what he'd been thinking of, instead continuing to Suna.

Naruto figured that it wasn't something he should know and followed along.

~~***~~

Jiraiya wasn't sure if it was fate of the good kind or fate of the bad kind that had him watching as _every single one of his fans_ in Karakura told him of their own attempts to recreate the sex scenes in his books, _complete with visual aids and everything._

Maybe there was something to be said for rabid fans, Jiraiya noted as he watched on, listening to various people comment on their own personal variations, like Ichimaru Gin and his lover Matsumoto Rangiku attempting the legendary scene from Icha Icha Violence.

Granted, he was strapped to a chair with no hope of escape, but still.

Maybe there was something to this whole role-play thing.

~~***~~

Entering Suna was simple. Naruto and Gaara had approached the gauntlet that was the only entrance in and out, the guards had been apprehensive until Gaara had given them his 'death glare' and said that Naruto was with him.

Needless to say, they'd let the pair through, and now Gaara had to endure Naruto berating him for acting so harshly.

"…I'm just saying, had you been a little nicer, he'd've checked my papers and we would have been free to do what we wanted here. Not on our way to the Kazekage's office to make sure the guy knows I'm here." Naruto rolled his eyes. "Besides, why d'you wanna let him know anyway."

"It would be idiotic to _not_ let him know you are here, and I see no reason not to inform him." Gaara was stopped by Naruto gripping his shoulders briefly before pulling back as the sand beneath his feet started encompassing his legs.

"Gaara," Naruto began, serious face in place. "I don't want anyone knowing I'm here. Barely anybody knew I was in the woods on the edge of the Land of Birds, and yet Akatsuki found me. I don't want to bring them here. To you."

"I can take care of myself." Gaara replied, and made the sand recede from Naruto's legs.

"Can you really hold your own against a group of people so powerful that just one of them alone can meet one of the Kage on equal grounds? 'Cause I was lucky in being able to escape, and don't think I'll be capable of taking any of them on anytime soon." Naruto responded, looking at the back of his friend as Gaara walked through the gauntlet towards Suna. "And I was able to meet you on equal ground, Gaara. As we are, we're only Chunin level at best, and not even the most skilled of Chunin can take on a Kage and hope to win."

 _That_ got Gaara's attention, as he stopped and looked back at Naruto.

"Then what do you propose we do?"

Naruto shook his head, and quietly answered, "I honestly don't know. Do what we can and train. Become stronger so that we can at least go down fighting, I guess."

The two looked at each other, gauging their options, when Gaara suddenly turned and started walking again.

"If we _are_ to defend ourselves, then we must know as much as we can about our enemy." Gaara spoke. "Come. We shall seek out Kankuro and learn all about this Akasuna no Sasori."

~~***~~

Sunagakure wasn't all that different from Konoha, Naruto noticed, as he walked down the street towards the housing where Gaara and his siblings were staying at.

The wary glances, looks of fear and anger were also all too familiar to Naruto, and he felt that he could sympathize with Gaara somewhat. Granted, all he had going for himself was being treated with total apathy, but he could definitely remember the people looking at him in fear and hatred when they thought he wasn't looking, whispering vile things about him when they thought he couldn't hear. Gaara, meanwhile, had to murder his uncle, who had wormed his way into his heart and then ripped it out before having to fend off the countless assassination attempts made by his own father.

And it was in that moment that Naruto reached an understanding of Gaara nobody else could ever hope to achieve.

Gaara had been forced to become the tool his father had wanted of him, and in doing so almost lost his mind. Almost lost his humanity.

Looking around, Naruto saw the truth of Suna: He saw things that he'd seen in the Land of Waves- shops with little to sell, people out on the street begging for food, money, safe housing. He saw the empty shops, the high prices, the look of desperation in the eyes of everyone in sight, even the ninja.

And it was then that he truly knew just how vastly different each of the Hidden Villages were. Back when he was young and just learning about the many Hidden Villages, he'd thought that all of them were just as big and bustling as Konoha.

Oh, how wrong he'd been.

Suna clearly wasn't as bustling as Konoha, and given that they'd only been walking for not even five minutes, and were already at the Kazekage's mansion in the middle of the village, Suna wasn't nearly as large as Konoha.

Gaara led Naruto inside, and went directly towards the living quarters.

"You live here?" Naruto was in awe. He'd never been in the part of the Hokage's Residence that they'd actually lived it, but he'd never thought in his wildest dreams that they'd live so _luxuriously._

"Yes." Was Gaara's succinct answer. "Kankuro's room resides down this way, and he can usually be found in there improving his puppets."

Naruto almost wanted to ask how Gaara knew that, but decided once again that there were some things about Gaara that he'll never understand.

They approached the simple door, white against the beige walls, and knocked.

~~***~~

Kankuro appeared to almost have a heart attack when he opened his door and saw Gaara standing there with the blonde Konoha-nin who'd defeated Gaara.

"May we come in?" Gaara politely asked. And that was another thing that had been changed about Gaara- he was using manners, asking if something he was about to do was okay or wanting to know their opinion on something that seemed entirely trivial to anyone else. Kankuro and Temari weren't sure if he was trying to be nicer or if he was simply acting that way just to see them freak out.

"Ye-yes." Kankuro certainly wasn't about to deny Gaara something he clearly wanted to do or know. He stepped back and let the duo in.

Kankuro's room was almost exactly like Naruto imagined it to be. There was a bed in the far corner, and to the side of it was a bookshelf filled with various scrolls. _Probably on puppetry,_ Naruto thought.

On the wall opposite of the bed, there was a dresser with a vanity mirror atop it, and Naruto had to prevent himself from bursting out laughing at the array of make-up products lying out atop it.

Scattered on the floor were various gears and puppet parts. _Looks like Gaara was right._ Naruto noted.

"Look, we need to keep this whole visit thing quiet, and the both of us would really appreciate it if you didn't tell _anyone_ that we were here." Naruto spoke for the first time since commenting on the grand scale of the mansion, and his comment was driven home by the dark look Gaara was giving Kankuro, who nodded. "So, what d'you know about Akasuna no Sasori?"

~~***~~

"Sasori was the greatest puppet master to ever exist after the creator of the puppet techniques, Chikamatsu Monzaemon. He was the first person capable of controlling more than 10 puppets at a single time, though he never told anyone just how he did it, and was made famous for using 100 puppets to obliterate a single fortress during a raid several years before the Sandaime Kazekage went missing and the Third Great Shinobi World War began." Kankuro explained. "Outside of the fact that he's the only known user of human puppets, no one knows what else he can do."

"Human puppets?" Naruto asked.

"It's said that Sasori was the first person to ever use living humans a puppets, and there are rumors that he'd been taking the bodies of people he'd defeated and turning them into actual puppets, though there is no proof to either of those claims, so the only people who could definitively say such a thing are the two elders Chiyo and Ebizu, and Sasori himself. "

"Is it possible to meet with either of those elders?" Gaara inquired, and Kankuro shrugged.

"I highly doubt it. Word is, both of them went crazy years ago, and spend all their time playing pranks on anyone they come across, even themselves." Kankuro said. "And even then, I don't think you can get anything out of them. After all, Sasori is the grandson of Chiyo, and she gets pretty tight-lipped when someone mentions him."

"So that's it, then?" Naruto asks, looking at Kankuro with some measure of disappointment. "He can control a hundred puppets, human puppets, at any one time." He sighed, shoulders slumping before realizing something. "What's so important about human puppets? Aren't they the same as regular puppets?"

Kankuro rolled his eyes before replying, "No, that's where everybody was wrong. By using actual human bodies as puppets, Sasori theorized that it was possible to use the chakra nature that that person had been able to use in real life. He even suggested that it was possible to use the Kekkei Genkai that a puppet could use when they were alive, but neither of those had ever really been verified, as the public thought that the rumors of Sasori's puppets being made from the bodies of real people disgusting. That's really all I know."

"Thanks, Kankuro." Naruto said somewhat more upbeat and like his old self in this environment. "But there's one thing I don't understand. What's chakra nature?"

"Don't they teach you anything in Konoha?" Kankuro muttered before responding. "You know how people can use elemental ninjutsu, right?" At Naruto's nod he continued. "Well, the reason people can do that is because their chakra coils naturally lean towards one of the five elements- fire, wind, water, lightning and earth. Elemental Kekkei Genkai don't fit under any of these categories, but the two elements that make them do. For example, your Shodai Hokage could use Wood Release, but that isn't one of the five elements. However, the two elements that combine to create it, earth and water, are two of the five elements. With me so far?"

"Yeah." Naruto said, though it left him with a few questions, he knew that only someone from Konoha would be able to answer them. "Thanks for explaining. We'll be on our way, and remember: _we were never here._ " That last part was hissed with Naruto putting on his serious face again before going back to his upbeat and cheerful self and leaving with Gaara.

The door closed, and Kankuro was left alone. He collapsed, shaking in fear, drenched in sweat and on the verge of hyperventilating.

_What the Hell?_

~~***~~

The view from atop the canyon made for an amazing sight as the Sun set on the horizon. Suna looked like it was built of gold, shimmering in the last dregs of sunlight, as Naruto watched on with Gaara.

"So, where are you going to go?" Naruto looked at Gaara in surprise, having thought that Gaara wasn't one to lead a conversation.

"I dunno. North, I guess, head into the Land of Earth. Might stay there for a while, probably head into Iwa; see if their ninja are anything like Konoha says they are." Naruto replied, turning back to watch the sunset.

"And what will you do if you come across Akatsuki?" Neither of them were looking at each other, for fear of seeing their friend for what may be the last time.

"I'll put up one hell of a fight, but I doubt I'll be able to get away from them a third time. The first was 'cause of Jiraiya and Sasuke showing up, while the second was luck, pure and simple." Naruto answered. "And you damn well better put up a _really_ good fight, or I'll kick your ass when we meet again." Naruto laughed again, but it simply served to increase the awkward.

"What if I went with you?" Gaara had singlehandedly taken the entire conversation and obliterated any of the tension.

"No. I won't let you ruin the bonds-" Naruto was cut off.

"I have tried, but there are no bonds with either of my siblings, and what I have with you is much stronger than my bond to them." Gaara tersely stated. "And no matter how much you may wish it, there is nothing I have not done to fix it. There is nothing keeping me here, and together we may be enough to fend off the Akatsuki."

Naruto was silent, considering the options.

Gaara was right; alone they couldn't face the Akatsuki on equal footing. And it was safe enough to assume that the other Jinchuuriki wouldn't be able to fight the Akatsuki off by themselves, no matter how powerful they were. Even if they were S-Class, it would only mean that they could fight on equal footing with one of the Akatsuki, and it would mean that they wouldn't win against two of the missing-nin in the organization. Presumably, they were put in pairs to compliment each other's abilities, meaning that they were doubly strong together, and were specially suited to take down any one of the Jinchuuriki.

Going by that logic, then it would mean that they would have a harder time taking down at least two Jinchuuriki at the same time. Which left Naruto with a single goal to do, in order to protect the world as well as ensure that he and his ilk lived as long as possible.

"Then we'll head north to the Land of Earth together." Naruto said with conviction, standing up and turning away from the city. Gaara was surprised at the ease in which Naruto had accepted that they were traveling together, and stood up, unfastening his Suna Hitai-ate from the shoulder strap of his gourd.

"What will we do?" Naruto turned back to look at Gaara, pure determination on his face as grim resolve set in.

"We'll get the other Jinchuuriki to side with us. We'll fight the Akatsuki, together."

And with that said, the two started north to Earth country, Gaara's Hitai-Ate quickly becoming buried underneath the sand of the desert. Behind them the sun set, leaving everything in the pitch black of the night.


	7. Introspective

It was the border between the Land of Rain and the Land of Wind, and they had been travelling for quite some time. They'd moved through the night and well into the day, until it was dusk and they'd reached the border town. The town itself was rather unassuming, almost blending into mountainous landscape, and the duo would have passed by it completely if they hadn't crossed paths with a merchant entering the Land of Wind. Shiba Kuukaku had been rather loud in pointing the way, her prosthetic arm having been remarkably responsive, despite simply being a plain old wooden arm. _Maybe it's like that puppet-body-thing that Sasori used…_ Shaking that thought for another time, Naruto thanked the outgoing fireworks vendor before heading with Gaara into town.

The trip had been a rather silent one for Naruto and Gaara, as Gaara had never been one for conversation, and Naruto had gone deep in thought.

While he may not have been the best at book smarts, he prided himself on his observational skill. And that skill told him everything about Gaara's reasons for going with him.

Gaara considered him important enough that he couldn't handle losing. _More than his siblings, at least…_ Naruto thought, as he approached the first motel he saw, only to realize.

He had no money.

Looking at Gaara, Naruto could instantly tell that he wasn't one to keep any money on hand.

And so, they found themselves camping out in the forest surrounding the small town of Hanakari, eating more of the jerky he'd been given from Hiyori a little over a week ago. Say what you will about the angry blonde girl, she made darn good jerky.

"You never really told me why you came with me." Naruto opened, looking at the fire in front of him. _Why do flames interest me so?_ Naruto silently hoped he wasn't some kinda crazed pyro, then remembered his first C-Rank mission, and the extremely flashy entrance he'd made at the final battle on the bridge. _Dammit I'm a pyro._ He was so caught up in his thoughts that he almost missed the response Gaara gave him.

"I already told you, there was nothing keeping me in that village." Gaara's response unnerved Naruto.

"Nothing? Not even your brother and sister?" Naruto looked over at the red-head, who was mechanically chewing on the jerky, and almost wished he knew what was running through the former psychopath's mind.

Almost.

"I had reached out to them as many times as I could, but they refused me." Gaara bluntly stated, and Naruto could detect a hint of _something_ in Gaara's voice. _Disappointment?_

"Well, what did you do?" Naruto shifted into a better position, leaning against a nearby tree (elm, he noted).

"I did many things. Asking for their opinions on anything I deemed on import, thanking them for being there, and yet no matter what I did, they appeared to be even more scared of me."

"Maybe it wasn't what you did, but _how_ you did it?" Naruto sagely answered, complete with faking the 'teacher' pose. Gaara simply stared on, not getting the jist of the joke. Naruto got out of the 'teacher' pose and sighed, muttering about 'crazy red-heads who wouldn't know comedy if it flew out of their asses'. Needless to say, Gaara was confused.

"I do not believe it was my actions, as I am positive that they were quite clear." Naruto leaned forward, but Gaara didn't elaborate, leaving Naruto momentarily slump his shoulders in defeat before jumping on Gaara's lack of faith.

"So that's it then? You just tried your best and when you didn't get the reactions you wanted you up and left the first chance you got, is that it?" Naruto was angry- no scratch that. He was _PISSED._ How could someone care so little for the faith of others in such a way?

"What do you expect me to do, Uzumaki. Go back to that place, and do as you do? Grin at them, smile when they glare, laugh at them while they scorn me?" Naruto, shocked out of his anger, looked away at that. "Even you cannot admit that it would be wise to do so. So, then what else am I to do except to go with you, the only other person I have met who can understand me?"

"Gaara," Naruto looked at him, and it appeared as though the weight of the world was slowly resting upon his shoulders. "I won't try to force you to go somewhere you hate, but that doesn't mean I'll always be there for you to follow. In fact, first chance I get, I'm sending you back there and I'll be right beside you, making sure that you build the proper bonds with your brother and sister, even if I have to kick your ass to get you there."

"Uzumaki, I do not believe that I will ever understand you." Gaara stated.

"Eh, no one really _can_ say they understand me, but feel free to try." Naruto lay down and rolled over, waving a hand in Gaara's direction. "Night."

Soon thereafter, soft snoring could be heard coming from Naruto, while Gaara simply leaned back against the tree behind him, next to his gourd, his sand contorting into the curve of his back. He lay there comfortably and watched Naruto sleep, the fire slowly burning itself out.

~~***~~

Back in Konoha, the remaining teams had practically disbanded. Kakashi had gone back into ANBU, and nobody had seen him since. Sakura had joined the vacant space in Team 10 left by Shikamaru's promotion to Chunin, training with Ino and working together to take the next Chunin Exams and get promoted to Chunin. Asuma and Kurenai had chosen to simply let their relationship become public, which had caused Shiranui Genma to win the betting pool on when they'd take the plunge (the pool was updated yearly, with the pot compounded as the new bets were placed). Now the betting pool was on when Asuma would knock up Kurenai.

Shikamaru worked on learning more of his clan's techniques, even creating a few of his own. Kiba was working on improving his Dual Piercing Fang, not wanting to have another mission end like the failed Sasuke Retrieval mission. Shino had gone deep into clan training with his Kikaichu, now quite open about his jealousy at Kiba having gone on the mission instead of him. Neji had worked with Hinata, helping her to move past Naruto, but try as he might, she couldn't completely move past it. Both Hyuga worked to improve their proficiency in the Gentle Fist. Gai and Lee were more exuberant than ever, working to become stronger than they were before, while Tenten had gone to Kurenai for help train in Genjutsu. Choji had become much more outgoing with mentioning his weight, and had gone on to become much, much stronger than he had before.

One thing was taboo for them all.

Uzumaki Naruto.

While they'd trained and acted like they'd gotten past it, they were still hung up on what he'd said, and a few had grown to resent him for the remarks he'd made.

In the long run, he'd turned them into the exceptional Shinobi they were meant to be.

In the short term, however…

Half of them had grown to resent Naruto for his words, and were glad that he'd been placed in permanent solitary. The other half had accepted what he'd said as problems they'd chosen to ignore, and were working to overcome them.

That said, a rift had grown between the group, and they weren't as close as before. Sakura, while training with the new team 10, had asked what had happened to them.

Nobody had an answer for her, but they all knew the reason.

Naruto was the glue that had brought them together, and without him, they were losing the friendship they once had.

~~***~~

Jiraiya had finally gotten out of Karakura, having promised the residents that he would return there soon, and was approaching the gates of Suna. His visage was hardened, and he was a man on a mission. Nothing was gonna stop him from completing his mission.

"Halt!"

…Except for gate officials.

~~***~~

When Naruto woke up, he had sat up and stretched, working out any stiffness he'd garnered from sleeping on the ground ( _Heh, like the fox would let me be stiff and sore, the way it heals me._ )Naruto internally rolled his eyes as he imagined Kyuubi sitting in its' cage howling at how trivial things such as muscle cramps and soreness made for a weak vessel.

And then Naruto noticed Gaara just sitting there, in almost exactly the same spot as he'd been in when Naruto had called it a night, staring at him.

"Uh, Gaara?" Naruto began, dreading the answer. "Have you been staring at me all night?"

"Contrary to what you believe Uzumaki, the world does not revolve around you." Gaara replied, causing Naruto's face to scrunch up in confusion.

"What?" Gaara sighed.

"No, I did not stare at you all night." Naruto sighed in relief. "I occasionally stared at the moon."

Gaara got up, not noticing Naruto's eyebrow start twitching, or the dead-pan look his face had donned.

"Um, do you know what the personal privacy is, Gaara?" The addressed teen simply stared at the blonde, who sighed. "Weren't there times back in Suna when you would do things that you'd rather be done without other people watching?"

"When I partook in the upkeep of my personal hygiene, yes." Naruto looked away, his face becoming slightly red at the turn the conversation had taken.

"Right, well… Sleep is one of those things that people don't like having others watch them do. Would you have liked to have people watch you while you bathed?"

"I would have killed them for intruding and interrupting the upkeep of my hygiene." Naruto's face went back into dead-pan mode, and his eye was twitching more than before. It took him a second to work up the ability to slap his hand over his face, keeping it there in order to regain his composure, before looking up at the cloudy sky.

Gaara simply figured that Naruto was thinking, and reached for the jerky and consuming several pieces, stopping several chews into the first bite and giving a grunt of approval before finishing the half-dozen in his hand.

"Gaara," Naruto began. "To other people, there are certain boundaries that others do not cross. Weren't there things that your siblings did that they wanted to do in private?"

"I do not know. Our interaction outside of missions was very minimal. Even when I tried to partake in group activities or inquired them about such things, it was not successful." By this point, Naruto's eyebrow threatened to start twitching again, and he was well on his way back into dead-pan look before sighing and giving up on the conversation.

"Look, there are just some things that, for the sake of other people's dignity" _and sanity_ "Other people do not, under any circumstances, do. Now come on, we've gotta get going." Naruto put out the fire and filled in the fire pit before packing up. Gaara simply shouldered his gourd and stood by, waiting for Naruto to finish. At that point, Naruto had noticed that Gaara was just standing there while he had to do all the dirty work, and began muttering about 'damned red-heads who don't know when others need help'.

Unknown to the two of them, their descent into the Land of Rain was observed by a pair of Jonin Ame-nin. They simply watched the two kids as they went in the direction of the Warzone of the Damned, not doing anything but silently wishing for painless deaths.

Several hours later, it started raining, erasing any trace remnants that the small alcove had been a campsite, and that either of the Ame-nin had ever been there.

~~***~~

"What do you mean, Gaara's missing?" Jiraiya had originally come to see if Naruto had hitched a ride with an outgoing caravan and made his way to Suna, but it appeared that there were bigger problems in the Land of Wind. As soon as he'd made his way into Suna, he'd contacted his spies in the Land of Wind, and had promptly been informed of two things:

Akatsuki was sighted moving into the Land of Wind.

Several days later, the Ichibi Jinchuuriki had disappeared overnight.

Normally, that wouldn't be much cause for concern, be seeing as the Akatsuki had entered the Land of Wind from the Land of Birds suggested that they had to have come from either the Land of Rain or the Land of Fire. His spies hadn't infiltrated the Land of Rain, and it was so closed off that not even a Kage could get in if they wanted, leaving one option left.

They'd just come from taking Naruto, and may have already extracted the Kyuubi.

Jiraiya didn't want to accept that reality, so he desperately hoped that Naruto was still alive, despite the evidence to support that he had disappeared completely from where the ANBU had dropped him off at.

And so, that left him standing in the recently instated Godaime Kazekage's office. Aesthetically, it wasn't much different from the Hokage's office. The color scheme was different, but otherwise, there was a bookshelf containing the laws of Sunagakure, important trade information, budgetary information, even the different bylaws that governed the individual clans within Suna.

Behind the desk, with the sunrise shining directly into the windows, Jiraiya had to cover his eyes to see the man sitting at the desk.

The Godaime Kazekage.

He wore a bandana upon his head, held up with his Hitai-Ate, though the entire left side of his face was hidden. The bandana was held down by strips of cloth, which wrapped around the bottom of his head and around his neck, disappearing within his Grey-beige Jonin flack jacket, which had a small cape attached to the back of it, covering his upper arms. Under his right eye were two red tattoos adopting the visage of two flames turned on their side. Sitting atop his head was a large, angular hat, with the Kanji for Wind in the middle of a blue spot marking the front of the hat.

This was Baki, the man who was instated as the new Kazekage once they'd realized that Gaara was missing.

"What I mean, Sannin of Konoha, is that I sent him out to patrol outside the wall of Suna, agreeing with his request to send him alone. The gate guards, whom you have met, did not report him having returned. It was not until the next day that we found out that he had still not yet returned. I'd sent out a team of Jonin to locate him, but they found nothing. I do not believe that he has gone off on his own, and lately he appeared to have been attempting to be considerate of others opinions, particularly his brother and sister's.

"When questioned, they said that their brother had not approached them for their opinion on him going out into the desert." Baki finished. "At that point, a state of emergency was called and I was made the Godaime, no longer the Acting Kazekage."

"I think I know who may have taken him." The answer prompted Baki to almost lose it as he stood up. "Now, before you go off trying to save him, you should know that at this point, all you'll bring home is his body."

"What are you talking about?" All emotion disappeared from the Kazekage's face, and Jiraiya suddenly found himself facing the elite Shinobi that was yearning to prove that he was deserving of the title of Kage. He steeled his resolve, despite being enough of a fighter that he could ( _probably_ ) take down the Kazekage without _too_ much effort on his part.

"I'm talking about an organization made up of S-Class missing-nin; an organization that wants to remove the Biju from within the Jinchuuriki, and has the means to do so." Jiraiya normally wouldn't explain such things to anyone that wasn't from Konoha, but desperate times called for desperate measures. "That organization is called Akatsuki, and by now they've already started the removal of the Ichibi from Gaara. It's too late to save him."

"There is nothing we can do?" Baki sounded strained. He hadn't expected such a horrible thing to occur. As Jiraiya's head moved in the negative, he realized that, while it may be too late to stop this Akatsuki from taking Gaara, he could at least spread word to the other nations of the Akatsuki and their intention with the Biju. "Then we will spread word throughout the Elemental Nations, ensuring that _everyone_ knows of this Akatsuki and their intention to turn the Biju into beasts of war against the Elemental Nations."

~~***~~

The Land of Rain certainly lived up to its' name, Naruto thought drearily as he rubbed his arms against each other. _Its' so damn cold here…_

Naruto looked at Gaara, who was having a worse time of it than he was. Gaara's sand was absorbing all the water that it came into contact with, so he had to expend extra chakra just to keep his gourd as a gourd. Not to mention the physical exertion of having to carry hundreds of pounds of wet sand, which was denser and heavier than dry sand.

Rubbing his arms to get the blood flowing, Naruto wondered if he should ask Gaara if he was okay, as the red-head wasn't showing any sign of being cold. _How can he not be cold? He's wearing a t-shirt and pants just like me!_

Clearly, Naruto had issues.

Looking around, there was nothing but the ruins of the city they were in, barely seen in the dark of the day. Naruto was humbled, and scared. This was the remains of a city, a snapshot of something they never taught in the academy: a warzone after the war. Several of the buildings still standing were in rather good condition, considering that over half of each individual building appeared to be cleanly cut. And if one looked close, they could see the ghosts of the ninja that had died, lingering in the shadows of the ruins, watching the every move of all the living that dared to pass through the city. And it wasn't just the ghosts of the ninja. In-between the flashes of lightning, the civilians that had died as a result of the battle between the Ame-nin and their foes could be seen, going about their lives as though they had never died. Occasionally, a few would be shown looking at the duo, and once Naruto thought he saw one of them beckon him over, like a father would his child.

"Gaara, let's get the hell out of this town as fast as possible." Naruto looked over at the red-head, who simply nodded, looking rather spooked himself.

After all, what good is an absolute defense against the immortal souls of the damned?

~~***~~

Rolling out the map, which Naruto did his best to keep dry, he looked over the map of the Land of Rain, figuring their location given their speed and time traveled.

Say what you will about him, but Uzumaki Naruto was much smarter than he appeared to be.

"All right." Naruto lifted his knee up and laid the map upon his upper leg, setting in on the remains of a wall. Or a ceiling. He wasn't sure which, but all he needed to know was that the remnants of the apartment building kept them dry and out of the rain. "It looks like we're about a week out from the Land of Earth, at this rate. If we're lucky and can pick up the pace, we should be able to shave a few days off of the trip. Once there, we can stop at this town here- Rukongai. It's labeled as a market town, with a few casinos. Guess I'll see if my lucky streak works just as well with gambling as it does with my fights. Do you agree?"

Gaara just looked at him before inclining his head in what Naruto had learned to interpret as being in the positive.

"Good." He rolled up the map. "Let's get some sleep here and head out in the morning."

~~***~~

That night had to be the scariest the two had ever had. Gaara, in accordance with Naruto's pleas, had taken to using the nights meditating, steeling his mind against the ramblings of Shukaku. While it was impressive at making entire hours seem like minutes, Gaara was still prone to being woken up by the slightest of sounds, making for great company for a light sleeper such as Naruto.

Out of the enclosed space, the rain continued, unrelenting in its onslaught upon the landscape.

Inside the dark remains of what had once been a house, Naruto laid against a pile of rubble, which had been crushed under his weight to fit him perfectly, while Gaara simply got into the basic meditative position, closed his eyes, and hadn't moved since.

More than an hour passed, and nothing changed. Gaara's sand had moved to enclose him, keeping the cold from affecting his body, while Naruto was left to fend off the cold for several minutes, fidgeting to keep warm until a blanket of sand moved to enclose him like it did Gaara. A nigh-incoherent thanks was given before all was silent once more.

And then there was sound.

Gaara was the first to wake, with Naruto barely a second later, shouldering the pack in a single smooth movement. The sand silently slithered back into the gourd, though the plug was left out for easy access.

Naruto, being the lighter of the two, moved towards the doorway of the wrecked room, looking out into the crumbled shell of the rest of the house. He had to stop himself from screaming.

When they had entered what had appeared to be an untouched house, all save for one room was obliterated, leaving a broken and crumbled shell of a house to stand.

Now, however, it was as though the inside hadn't been gutted at all.

Naruto looked back at Gaara, who swiftly moved to see what the problem was.

The house was bright, and the second floor, which had not existed previously, was very obviously there. Sitting in the kitchen were a family of civilians, all of them brunettes with grey eyes. There were the parents, who looked to be in their early thirties, a teenage daughter, a younger son who looked to be about 6 years of age, and small toddler running around being chased by the mother while the father stood at the stove cooking food.

The duo started backing up, eyes wide with fear, until they hit the wall.

"Is there another way out?" Gaara's voice was soft, barely carrying unto Naruto's ears.

"No, that's why we chose this room. It's closed off from the outside and warm." Naruto answered, not turning his head away from the impossible thing in front of him.

"Perhaps it is a Genjutsu?" Gaara stated.

"Not likely. You have enough of Shukaku's chakra in you that any Genjutsu won't really work on you." Naruto replied, before an idea came to him. "If I can blow through the wall behind us, then it's a straight shot outside, right?"

"My understanding of the layout of this building has outside being on the other side of this wall, yes." Gaara didn't see where the blonde was going with that thought. As far as he knew, there was nothing in their arsenal of jutsu that was powerful enough.

"Good. Be prepared to run." Naruto held out his hand, doing something that was a first for him: a one-handed Rasengan. He launched his arm out, making noise as it crushed the wall in front of him, sending shrapnel into the room around him, making Gaara's sand raise in front of him in defense. The second Naruto was through, he ran, the room collapsing in around him as Gaara slipped out, following Naruto as the two ran, the house turning into rubble behind them.

The sound of the family laughing, however, did not cease until well into the morning.

~~***~~

Several days passed, though it didn't appear that way. All Naruto knew was that when it was nighttime, the darkness descended into a pitch-black that ate up all light that dared to intrude upon its' domain.

Ever since the night at that house, the ghosts of the damned began to follow them everywhere they went, even to the barren, muddy fields, where a spiky-orange-haired, blue-eyed Ame-nin could be seen simply watching them as they went past, his form disappearing in the instants that lighting lit up the sky and surrounding area.

Soon afterwards, they reached the border, and were in the Land of Earth, the ghosts of the damned watching from where the rain and clouds stopped, staring at two souls that had been able to escape their grasp.

For now.

~~***~~

The Land of Earth was completely different from the Land of Rain. Where the Land of Rain had been like a perpetual swampland where the few forests were, the Land of Earth was mountainous. The sweeping beauty of the mountains was a sharp contrast to the dark marshes, grabbing and holding on the souls of all who died there. Where the swampland and half-sunken ruins of dozens of cities were a veritable hell, the mountains appeared to sweep you up, pulling you towards the heavens to feel even a brief glimpse of what it must be like in the afterlife.

The bustling market city of Tenshi-Gai appeared as its' name suggests: city of heaven. The people walking around appeared to perpetually be happy, accepting anyone into their graces. The entire city appeared to shine with a holy light as the sun hit it while rising in the sky, and there were rumors that it looked like it was on fire when watching the light of the sunset on the city from a distance.

Naruto liked it.

Gaara didn't.

"While I understand the need to get more supplies, I do not understand how we will get money gambling when we have no money to gamble." Gaara stated, as they walked into one of the casinos, a little joint that looked like someplace that Tsunade would have frequented.

"That's easy. I know a bit about gambling. Granny Tsunade's _very_ talkative when she's in the right state of drunkenness." Gaara just looked at Naruto, the explanation not good enough. He rolled his eyes and chuckled, an odd sound with his smooth voice that got more than a few women to look around, trying to find the source of that sultry sound. "Besides, all we need to do is sweet-talk the owner into loaning us just enough to start. From there, we'll win enough to pay him back, and still have enough left over to keep us afloat for a while."

"Your financial skills are highly admirable."

"Well, back at the orphanage, they taught us how to budget our income before teaching us anything else." Naruto replied as they approached the loans office.

~~***~~

"I must admit that I did not believe that your plan would work." Gaara bluntly stated as Naruto handed him enough chips to pay back the loan, before sending him on his way with strict orders to _say nothing except to state the reason he went there._ They were currently seated in a poker table, with Naruto being the clear one to beat, what with the small mountain of chips in front of him.

"Well, well, well." A voice said, approaching the table. "Looks like you're the one to beat in this casino."

"Yeah. I must be lucky, never played before." Naruto said, pretending to look at his winnings in awe. "And to be honest, I don't really know the rules all that well."

"Yer a damn good liar, kid, I'll give you that." The person said as he sat down at the table. He had red hair, a brighter shade than Gaara's, and wore it in a high ponytail, almost becoming a topknot. On his head, he wore an oddly shaped brown headpiece, looking almost like a crown. The headpiece appeared to travel down and over the bridge of his nose, and in the center of it sat a Hitai-Ate, signaling that the person who bore it was allied with Iwa. His clothes appeared rather simple: a purple shirt with skintight cloth gauntlets on both his arms, and a sleeveless flak jacket on over his shirt. "The name's Roshi. What's yours?"


	8. Yonbi & Gobi

In the city of Tenshi-Gai, there was a casino. It was rather simple in looks, the same as any other casino, and appeared to be no different than any other casino in the Elemental Nations, with the sole exception that it was about to be known as the place that the entirety of history changed.

Sitting across from each other were two people, one a red-headed Iwa-nin in his thirties, staring down his opponent: a twelve-year-old blonde-haired, blue-eyed child. They were currently locked in psychological warfare, staring each other down and trying to call the other's bluff.

In the end, the both kept raising, until the pile in the middle of the table was the largest that the casino had ever seen.

Standing behind the blonde-haired child was another child, a red-head like his friend's opponent, but the trio clearly was not related to each other, given that the blonde was tanned where the red-head was pale, and neither bore any resemblance to the thirty-five-year-old man sitting across from them.

Eventually, they both turned their heads, setting their twin piercing gaze upon the poor cardholder, who asked the players to show their hands.

"Three of a kind, kid. Beat that." The man said, setting down his cards, showing a trio of nines, and setting aside the useless two and five.

"How about a Royal Flush, Aces high." Naruto gave, laying down his entire hand before turning to the cardholder to see who won.

"The child wins the pot." The man stated, looking like he'd rather be anywhere than standing between the two. "And I must implore you to be on your individual ways, as the last pot very nearly broke the bank."

"Alright." Roshi conceded, taking his chips and placing them into a small pouch. "I know when I'm beat. Though, kid, I'd really like to know where you learned to bluff so well."

Naruto simply gave a knowing smile, looking at the man in amusement before answering with four simple words.

"I know a guy."

Roshi laughed.

"I do too, but he isn't nearly as good a teacher as you've had, apparently."

Naruto grinned, and he and Gaara worked to pile their small mountain of chips into their backpack.

"I dunno. You were pretty good yourself. How's about we trade notes?" Naruto's smirk made Roshi stop in his tracks, looking at Naruto oddly.

"You know," He said, putting his chin in his hand. "You look like someone I once knew in a half-remembered dream."

"Don't drag me into your limbo, old man." Naruto replied, kinda creeped out.

"I'm 35." Was Roshi's reply, and with that, he went to cash his chips. "And why don't you meet me out front, one-tail and nine-tail."

The two stiffened, and Gaara looked at Naruto, presumably for guidance.

"Shall I kill him?" Naruto palmed his face, having seen and heard the dead seriousness.

"No, Gaara."

"Are you sure we would not be better off with him dead?"

"Yes, Gaara."

"Because I could very easily-"

"Gaara! No!" Naruto yelled out, his face coming out of his hands as he started moving towards the trade counter. "Jeez, what's with you and being all death-happy all of a sudden?"

"I have always been eager to kill; it is just that we have not encountered anyone whom I can satisfy it upon."

Naruto's head never left the palm of his hand as he traded in the chips for cash.

~~***~~

"So, it is impolite to ask if it is okay to kill someone?" At Naruto's nod, he continued. "Then I will not ask in the future."

"GRAH! No! It is not good to kill anyone you want, anytime you want, anywhere you want."

"But then, what am I to do in battle if I cannot kill?" Naruto's eyebrow threatened to fling off of his face, the way it was twitching, before an idea came to him.

"Actually, I just remembered. It _is_ polite to ask for my permission to kill someone, so long as you don't do it if I say no." Naruto looked pleased with himself. Now he wouldn't have to deal with Gaara's twisted logic for several hours.

"Then why did you not say so?"

_Dammit!_

"Hey!" The duo turned, looking to see Roshi approach them, a bag slung over his shoulder. "I see the two of you are pretty good at following orders."

"Yeah, yeah." Naruto chose to cut to the chase. "Why'd you say that?"

"Say what? I wasn't aware I'd said anything to you except to meet me out here." Roshi looked bemused at the grumpy expression on Naruto's face.

"Stop screwing around, you know what I'm talking about." Naruto's grumpy expression disappeared in an instant, and Roshi suddenly knew where he'd seen the kid's face before.

"I meant what I said, but first I've gotta ask," Roshi said, bending down to reach Naruto's height. While he was no longer the shortest of the Konoha 11, he was still growing, and had been growing steadily during the past few weeks. As it stood, his baggy clothes weren't as bad as when he'd first woken up in them. "Are you related to the Bloody Habanero, by any chance?"

"The Bloody what?"

~~***~~

Iwagakure stood off in the distance, blending into the mountainous surroundings by having had the tops of the small rocky spires turned into the buildings that made up the Hidden Village.

Two figures stood in the distance, watching the village for a single person. One man was tall, easily towering over the other at over six feet in height. Anything else to describe the man was hidden underneath the black cloak decorated with red clouds he wore, making him appear smaller than he really was. His head was covered with a long bandana, which held a piece of cloth to cover all of his face below the eyes, which held pupil-less green irises with red sclera.

"Be on the lookout, Hidan. It should be quite clear to find my target." His gruff voice told his shorter compatriot, who had pupil-less amethyst eyes and slicked back silver hair.

"Yeah, yeah." The newly-named Hidan replied, looking out over the city. He wore cloak of the same design as his partner, but instead of having it completely closed off, he had the top undone, showing his bare chest, along with the emblem he had hanging from a chain necklace, of a triangle in a circle. "So you were told what he looks like. Mind filling me in?"

"Trust me, you'll know him when you see him." The man replied, making his partner twitch in annoyance.

"You know, Kakuzu, you make it really hard for me to work with you sometimes." Hidan said, looking back out at the hundreds of people waking up and beginning to go about their day, a look in his eye that many would recognize as bloodlust. "But, if it means that I can get to kill those people in the name of Jashin, then I think I can deal."

The newly named Kakuzu simply stood there, ignoring his idiotic partner in favor of scanning the Iwa-nin for the Jinchuuriki of the Gobi.

"Just who do you think you are, intruding upon Iwagakure like this?" A baritone voice emanated from behind them, making Hidan move away while an extremely dense jet of water shot out of Kakuzu's back, ripping a hole in his cloak. They mystery man simply held out his hand, making the jet of water turn into steam, which got sucked up into the apparatus situated upon his back. "Perhaps you did not hear me the first time, who are you and why do you intrude upon Iwagakure like this?"

 _Well, well, well…_ Kakuzu thought, turning to meet his attacker- and finding his target. _Maybe this will be easier than I thought…_

~~***~~

"What are they teaching kids these days, if you don't know about the Bloody Habanero?" Roshi asked, looking at them disbelievingly. "Do you at least know about the Yellow Flash?"

"Yes." Naruto replied quickly. "He was the Yondaime Hokage, served as such for a little over 3 years before dying to save the village from destruction at the feet of the Kyuubi."

"That's good enough, but you glossed over several things, gaki." Ignoring the blonde's cry that he wasn't a gaki, Roshi continued. "You obviously don't know of his exploits on the battlefield of the Third Great Shinobi World War. In one battle, he slaughtered 50 Iwa-nin in a single second, not to mention the hundreds he'd killed in the border skirmishes. The Bloody Habanero didn't garner as many kills as he did, but she was dangerous in her own right. I was the only one to survive against her when we reached the gates of Konoha. A platoon of almost two hundred, dead within minutes."

"Wow. I've never heard of her." Naruto was shocked that there were other legends from the Third Great Shinobi World War than the Yellow Flash. "Do you know what her name is?"

"I do not, though I heard she died when the Kyuubi had appeared within the walls of Konoha." Roshi stated, looking downcast at that. "And I wanted to know her name so badly. Ah! Where are my manners? I've forgotten to ask for your names."

"Uzumaki Naruto."

"Sabaku no Gaara."

"And while we're at it, you mind telling me just why there are two Jinchuuriki from Hidden Villages not associated with the Land of Earth doing here?"

~~***~~

Kakuzu had to almost kill Hidan in order to be able to properly take down his target, and was now in heated battle with the Steam Release user. He had to admit that it was quite hard to take down someone who could combat all his attacks with that damnable steam of theirs.

It was the most fun Kakuzu had had in a long time.

Pointing his right arm at Han, it extended forth, detaching from the rest of his body, yet still held up by black threads. And from the stump of his arm came a beating, pulsating mass of those tentacle-like black threads, and with them came a mask, which held the likeness of a bull drawn with yellow lines.

The mouth opened.

Han sent out his steam.

There was a sound of thunder.

And all went still.

~~***~~

"Uh, well…" Naruto started stuttering, and was saved by Gaara, who bluntly stated:

"He was banished from his village and I chose to follow him when he came to mine." Naruto didn't know quite why his eyebrow kept twitching, but he was sure that it hadn't done so _before_ Gaara joined him on his journey. Roshi simply stared on, surprised at the frankness of the young red-head. _Let's see…_ Roshi thought. _He's definitely from Suna, and I know enough to figure that the blonde one is from either Kumo or Konoha, which means…_

"You contain the Ichibi." He pointed at Gaara, then at Naruto. "Which makes you the holder of the Kyuubi."

The simple quirking of an eyebrow told him that the red-head had expected this, while the facepalm of the blonde completely shocked him. The red-head turned to the blonde.

"Now may I-"

"No means no, dammit!"

The blonde's head never rose from his hands as he said that. If anything, it seemed to go deeper into them, if that was possible.

Roshi didn't quite know what to think of them.

~~***~~

 _We're dead. So dead. Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead._ Naruto began to sing the word in his head like some kinda demented mantra. Here they were, no stronger than fresh Chunin, and they had just been outed by an Iwa Jonin. Naruto's face met his palms and he began to pray that something, anything, really, happened so that they could get the Hell out of dodge.

"Now may I-" _Oh gods, is Gaara asking to kill the guy_ _ **now**_ _?_

"No means no, dammit!" He responded, before burying his face deeper into his hands.

_Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead…_

 ~~***~~

Kakuzu's eye started twitching.

Lightning hadn't worked as well as he'd hoped. If anything, it made the Jinchuuriki's steam more powerful.

Lightning beats water every time, dammit!

Clearly _he_ had issues.

Sighing, he was about to do something he'd never done before, and hoped to whatever god there was he would never have to do again. His only prayer went out to being able to face himself later on, when it was all over.

"Hidan, get your ass over here and help me!"

"What, I thought that the _great and mighty Kakuzu, slayer of hundreds,_ could take on a simple Jinchuuriki. It's only steam after all!" Was Hidan's sarcastic reply from where he'd taken refuge. A quarter mile up the mountain.

"Shut up and haul ass before I kill you!" Kakuzu was getting irritated. He was just one insult away-

"Like you can kill me!" That's it. Hidan was gonna die by Kakuzu's hand, no matter what.

Han merely watched the interaction before setting his steam upon Kakuzu, who dodged, before going in close for the kill-shot, his arm ready with the Earth Release: Earth Spear.

Nothing would stop him from winning the battle, if only just to kill Hidan for his heckling on the sidelines.

"You can do it Kakuzu! Steam is a weak-ass element!" That comment seems to make the Jinchuuriki double-up on his attacks, his eyes reflecting the pure _rage_ boiling within him from Hidan's comment.

Yes, he'll enjoy killing Hidan _so much_ it'll hurt.

~~***~~

"So, since _you_ , blondie," Here Naruto started moaning and began to mutter the word 'dead' over and over under his breath. "Appear to be the boss, how's about you tell me: Is your friend here telling the truth?"

Naruto broke his mantra to nod, his face pale, before descending back into his mantra. Roshi sighed. _Why are all the people I meet insane?_

Gaara simply glared at Roshi, focusing all his killing intent towards the man, who was able to shrug it off like Gaara was a fly on his shoulder.

"Look, I'm not gonna turn you in to Iwa or hurt you." At this Gaara's glare lessened, though the killing intent remained as it was, while Naruto had stopped chanting and was slowly regaining his color. "I'd just like to know something about you guys. See, I'm the Jinchuuriki for the Yonbi no Saru and-"

Gaara's glare redoubled, while Naruto turned _ashen_ before curling up in the fetal position, the mantra resurfacing with vigor. A crowd began forming around them, the meeting brought to their attention by the blonde in the fetal position in the middle of the street.

Roshi sighed again.

~~***~~

"That's it, you've got him on the run! Hurry and take him down now!" Kakuzu didn't know if Hidan was deliberately cheering for the Jinchuuriki or not, but all he knew was that he was about to call a truce in order for the both of them to kill Hidan.

Maybe then he'll be able to take down his target.

"Come on, man! You're winning! Take him-huh?" Hidan was interrupted when Kakuzu had pointed his arm at Hidan, sending his hand towards him as fast as was possible. Kakuzu's hand latched onto Hidan's leg, who had barely had time to acknowledge the act, before using his arm as a slingshot, sending him flying.

He collided with the Jinchuuriki, and both were down soon after.

Kakuzu almost smiled.

It seemed that Hidan had his worth alive after all.

~~***~~

"Nothing to see here folks, just a few rowdy teens who wanted to gamble." Roshi said, picking up the blithering blonde and heading towards the outskirts of town, the red-head hot on his tail.

Soon he reached a secluded enough spot and began to slap some sense into the ashen blonde. Literally.

It had taken quite a few slaps before the gaki would even begin to respond, and a half-dozen after that to get him back to normal.

"Now," Roshi affixed a stern eye on the blonde. "As I was saying before I was interrupted, I am the Jinchuuriki for the Yonbi no Saru-" He redoubled the stern look on Naruto, keeping him from having a near-mental breakdown. "And I'd like to know what your relationship with your Biju is."

"Shukaku does not allow me to sleep, as doing so plagues me with its' bloodiest memories. Other than that, any usage of the demonic chakra has me changing into the beast, and it forcing me into using the Tanuki Sleep jutsu." Gaara replied, and Roshi nodded sagely.

"And you, boy?" Roshi now turned to Naruto, who took a second to start talking.

"Kyuubi does not seem to like me, as the one time I've talked to it, the Fox made it clear that it'd like nothing more than to watch me die as it escapes the seal. I can only use chakra when my life depends on it, or if I'm _really_ mad. I've not drawn on much of its' chakra yet, but when I drew upon enough, it altered my mind for over a week, making me extremely angry." Naruto went on. "No one, not Granny Tsunade, or even that pervy sage Jiraiya could figure out what caused it to do that." Roshi nodded in contemplation before providing his answer.

"Sounds like you've simply had the common problem every Jinchuuriki had when they drew upon enough of their demon's chakra to form the first tail for the first time."

"What was it?" Naruto looked interested, having never known that there was so much to learn about Jinchuuriki, and Gaara had to admit that the knowledge was quite important to have.

"You weren't prepared for it, and the excess chakra lingered in the part of your mind that lets you draw upon it. And the reason for it lasting so long is that everybody underestimates the density of demonic chakra, which is why it took a week for your body to filter it out of your system." Roshi stated. "Had something happened while you were in the first tail state to use up the excess chakra, you would have been perfectly fine." Roshi sagely said. "I've had it happen myself, as have the Jinchuuriki before me, and so will those after me."

"So it happens to all the Jinchuuriki?"

"Only those that haven't prepared for such a thing- it's rare, but it happens." Roshi answered. "And after that once, it doesn't happen again."

Naruto looked much more like his old self, and Roshi suddenly realized that the battle at the Gates of Konoha was where he'd seen someone like Naruto.

"What did you say your name was?"

"Uzumaki Naruto. Why?"

"Because you look like a young version of Namikaze Minato, the Yellow Flash of Konoha."

~~***~~

Kakuzu strode over towards the two, and saw that, while Hidan was still lying on the ground, the Jinchuuriki was getting up. Seizing his chance, he curled his hand into a fist, hardened it with Earth Release: Earth Spear, and sped forth, hitting the Jinchuuriki with a gut shot, then an uppercut for good measure, which sent the Jinchuuriki down.

"Hey, you wanna help me over here. Your damned plan snapped my neck!" Well, there went his good mood. Kakuzu turned to his partner, looked at him for a second before bending down to pick up his target.

"Fix it yourself." Was his oh so succinct answer.

"How?" Here Hidan twisted his head, watching as Kakuzu started walking away, his target hoisted over his shoulder and against his back. "If you haven't noticed, I can't move anything below the neck. That means that you either leave me here to be found by Iwa-nin, spilling all our secrets to them, or you carry both me and-hurk!"

Hidan was cut off when one of Kakuzu's black threads struck out and hit him, digging into his neck and connecting the separated vertebrae back together. Hidan lifted his arm to grab at the pain that was emanating from his neck that he was sure was going to remain there. Kneading the muscles and shifting his head, he looked over at Kakuzu, a dark smile on his face.

"Now that's more like it." Kakuzu, however, chose to ignore the silver-haired man, not stopping in his journey west.

"You'd best hurry up. We don't need the annoyance of the Iwa-nin that undoubtedly heard the battle." Hidan looked put out but followed anyway.

"Aww, and I didn't get to sacrifice anyone to Jashin!"

The duo fled west; to the base they had on the border of the Land of Earth and the Land of Marsh. There they would meet up with another member and aid him in obtaining another Jinchuuriki.

~~***~~

"Yeah, right. Like I'm related to him." Naruto started laughing at the insinuation that he was the child of the Yondaime Hokage.

"I'm serious kid." Roshi stated, looking at the blonde suspiciously. "I'd bet the Yonbi on it."

The sudden knowledge of just how serious Roshi was, if he was willing to bet the demon his body needed to keep living, cast a pall upon the group, and Naruto stopped laughing, opting to simply stare at the ground.

"I am not surprised at that revelation. Uzumaki does bear a striking resemblance to the Yondaime Hokage." Gaara said, looking at Roshi.

"Why?" Naruto said, catching the attention of the two red-heads.

"I don't know, but if I had to guess, I'd say that he couldn't ask anyone to do something-" Roshi was cut off.

"No I figured that already. What I don't understand is why I was never told of either of my parents." Here Naruto looked at the two, who found themselves in a position that neither wanted to be in: emotional comfort.

"Well, back in Iwa, they're still pretty sore about how bad he beat us, and a few would gladly take any chance to get some sort of vengeance upon the man. Desperate people are not above killing newborns, so long as they achieve what they set out to do." Roshi stated, once more with the 'sage' voice. "As for your mother, perhaps your caretaker-"

"I grew up in a public orphanage, the caretakers treated me like they would any other." Naruto cut in. "After I joined the academy, I moved into an apartment, like the others who'd signed up. From there I'd lived alone."

"Oh." Roshi looked uncomfortable discussing such things. "Well, we already know why they didn't tell you about your father, but I think that you may have been meant to have been told about your mother when you reached a certain age."

"The scroll!" Naruto's face lit up, and he set his backpack on the ground before starting to dig into it.

"Scroll?" Roshi looked to Gaara for an explanation.

"This is the first I've heard of a scroll." Gaara answered, and the two looked at the blonde squatting on the ground digging through clothes and money.

"AHA!" He cried, lifting the scroll he'd originally dismissed when he'd woken up weeks ago. His face of triumph instantly disappeared when the scroll was snatched out of his hands by the older red-head, who opened it up.

"Huh." Roshi said, and no emotion could be seen upon his visage. "Uzumaki Kushina, the Red Hot-Blooded Habanero." He looked up at Naruto. "Seems you're a legend in the making, gaki."

"Really? My mother's the one you fought against?" Naruto was amazed at having had a pair of famed parents, and also slightly intimidated. _I've a long way to go if I'm to ever live up to their expectations…_

Roshi kept reading, his face impassive, until he got to a single line, where his eyes widened and his mouth was agape.

"My god." He almost whispered, and Naruto looked concerned whilst Gaara was showing that he was openly interested in the conversation. Roshi looked at Naruto, and the blonde's blood froze in his veins once the man's next sentence sunk in. "She was the previous Jinchuuriki for the Kyuubi."

~~***~~

Kakuzu and Hidan made their way to the border as fast as they could, passing by the outskirts of Tenshi-Gai, the legendary marketing city of the Land or Earth, when they passed by three people- an Iwa-nin and two teens- one blonde and the other a red-head like the Iwa-nin.

The trio looked at the Akatsuki duo before the Iwa-nin recognized the man Kakuzu had slung over his back.

"Let him go." The Iwa-nin's voice was filled with enough killing intent that Kakuzu felt the need to be wary around him- he was definitely a Jonin, possibly S-Class. The two kids looked surprised at the Iwa-nin's reaction, and Kakuzu realized why: they were still moving as fast as they could, and it was highly likely that they couldn't see the instantaneous reaction.

"Shit. Pick up the pace Hidan, we're gonna have a tail." Hidan couldn't look happier at the news, and Kakuzu figured that his partner was already thanking his thrice-damned god for such luck.

The Akatsuki duo did not stop, continuing on to their destination.

~~***~~

"What? Let _who_ go?" Naruto was confused. One second he was talking to Roshi about his mother, talking about how she was the previous Jinchuuriki for the same demon he had sealed in him, when suddenly Roshi looked behind him and Gaara, telling someone to 'let him go'. Roshi suddenly realized that Naruto and Gaara hadn't noticed the cloaked duo, so he made a sudden decision.

"Pack up your stuff and follow me, boys. My friend's been kidnapped and we're gonna rescue him."


	9. Zombie

The pursuit was long, and gave Naruto time to think.

His father was the Yondaime.

The Yondaime sealed Kyuubi into him.

The Kyuubi had a Jinchuuriki before him.

That Jinchuuriki was his mother.

Without the Kyuubi, his mother would have undoubtedly died.

This left Naruto confused. He had always longed to know the identity of his parents, but had accepted that it might never happen, due to so many others having been orphaned on the day of his birth. Back in the orphanage, there had been few who were old enough to remember their parents, and even fewer who could claim they knew with certainty who their parents were.

Now that he knew, however, Naruto wondered if he ever should have been told.

There were few things that he could accurately define as the absolute truth, and from what he had learned these past few hours, even those were called into question.

Why was he loyal to a village that had hated his very existence?

Why was his status as a Jinchuuriki kept secret from him for all those years?

_What was the truth?_

From what little he knew, it seemed that his father had longed to be the greatest Shinobi in all of existence, to have the strongest tools to use. He had to, to have garnered such infamy. Naruto remembered a girly-looking boy, and his claim that his only purpose in life was to serve his master, to give his life if his master so desired. Was that what his father had desired? To befriend his mother, and get her to become the perfect tool for him?

What had that meant for his mother, for Kushina, when she hadn't become the perfect tool for his father? When she told him that she was pregnant? Was it then that the Yondaime had figured that he could remove Kyuubi from Kushina, seal it in his son- _in Naruto_ \- and simply raise the child to be the perfect tool, even better than Haku had been for Zabuza?

Naruto didn't know.

He didn't _want_ to know. Because then he'd be forced to hate the one person in existence he'd idolized. The one person who he'd always strived to become a better Hokage than.

And that's when it hit him, as he followed Roshi, Gaara at his side.

The Sandaime was a smart man. The smartest in all the Elemental Nations- he was hailed as the greatest of the Kage because of it!

Which meant that he had to know.

Which meant that he did know. The scroll from Tsunade had said that the scroll about his mother was something the Sandaime wished to give to Naruto in person. That meant he knew that his mother had been Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki. That he knew that the Yondaime was turning his son into the perfect tool for himself.

And yet...

The Sandaime had still preached the best of his successor to Naruto, back when he was little. Had he been making sure that Naruto didn't hate his father when he finally found out? Or was he just ensuring that Naruto became the perfect tool for Konoha, like his father had wanted for himself?

Naruto began questioning all of his life.

He had first wanted the role of Hokage not because of his need to have people look up to him instead of down, but because the Sandaime had made it seem like the greatest thing to achieve in life.

He had become a ninja for that very purpose. It had been the very reason he'd joined the academy, as the Sandaime had given him the very push into doing so, when he'd been uncertain about life as a ninja.

Naruto hated to think in such negative terms, but it was the closest thing to the truth as he was gonna get for what might be _years._

Now that he had his resolve back, he wondered why he and Gaara were helping the guy in front of them get his friend back. They had nothing outside of helping the guy out of the kindness of their hearts. And even then, it wasn't completely known.

"Hey, Gaara." Naruto asked, his face showing his uncertainty. His red-headed companion inclined his head, which Naruto took to mean that he was listening. "Why are we helping this guy?"

"I do not know, but I believe that it is because he is quite knowledgeable in Jinchuuriki, which could prove useful to us."

"Huh?" Gaara sighed, and Naruto could tell that he struck a nerve.

"He knows things about Jinchuuriki that we do not. We would like to know those things. So, we help him, and he tells us what he knows."

"Well why didn't you say so in the first place?" Naruto was exasperated, and Gaara sighed again.

"I did, you just did not understand the wording."

Naruto's eye went right back to twitching as they ran across the mountainous plain, using all they could to keep up with the speeds the Iwa Jonin in front of them was hitting.

"Stop! They doubled back, turn around!"

~~***~~

Kakuzu almost sighed.

The day had been pretty par for the course, so he hadn't had much in the way of complaints. He'd had a small moment of- not elation, that kinda thing he'd long since abandoned- content when he'd taken down his target whilst simultaneously getting cathartic on Hidan's ass.

And then they just _had_ to come across an Iwa Jonin- an S-Class one, by the feel of his killer intent.

And now that S-Class Iwa Jonin was following them.

And gaining on them.

_Dammit._

"Hidan, hold up." Kakuzu said, stopping suddenly and looking around. The mountainous terrain had given way to humid forest, and the ground was becoming less like ground and more like swamp. They were close to, if not in, the Land of Marsh. If they continued with the tail, then it would follow them, and one of their hideouts would be outed.

Kakuzu may have been many things, but one thing he never did was fail a mission.

Not again.

And if it took killing their tail to do so, so be it.

~~***~~

Naruto kept moving, his eye having slowly stopped twitching, but he was panting, tired from the chase. His legs felt like they were on fire, and the flow of cool air in his hot lungs made them feel like they weren't even there, making him almost gasp for breath. If it weren't for his own chakra boosting those parts and Kyuubi's healing, Naruto was sure that he would have dropped down in exhaustion some time ago. Next to him, Gaara showed no change, but Naruto figured that he had to be in the same situation. In front of the two, Roshi kept going, grim determination coupled with an almost-blind rage set upon his visage, which made Naruto cringe.

_Gotta remember to never piss him off…_

Looking around as much as he could when moving at such high speeds, Naruto saw that the mountains spiked up one last time before descending into a lush forest that was so humid it was felt several seconds of high-speed travel before entering the forest proper. Once they made the descent the air became thick, almost like it was pressing down upon the trio. Naruto found it kinda hard to breathe, and a quick look over to Gaara revealed that the insomniac was on the verge of losing it, having grown in an environment where the air was dry and arid, not humid to the point where it was like breathing water.

_Oh, crap!_

"Gaara." Naruto's voice didn't reach the hyperventilating red-head, so he tried harder, more forcefully. He wouldn't have Gaara lose it, not when they were helping a man that could kill them on a whim. "Gaara! _Look. At. Me!_ "

 _This_ reached the sand user, who snapped his head to look at the blonde. Gaara's face was contorted in something akin to the face one sees when another has a heart attack. His eyes were as wide as possible, pure fear reflecting within the teal depths. Naruto moved in front of Gaara, so that the former Suna-nin wouldn't hit anything in his path.

"Now, I know you aren't used to a place like this, but I want you to do exactly what I say. Do you understand?" A terse nod and Naruto continued. "I want you to channel some chakra into your lungs, and then take slow, deep breaths, okay? Slow, deep breaths."

Gaara nodded, and he started doing as Naruto said. Taking a slow breath in, he found that the chakra in his lungs seemed to make it so he could breathe normally. His face returned to its' normal, apathetic look, though he gave Naruto a tiny half-smile in gratitude, which the blonde returned in full.

"If we're gonna stick together, we gotta look out for each other, right?" Naruto answered Gaara's unspoken thanks before looking back at Roshi, who appeared to be slowing down.

"We're close!" Roshi growled, and the blonde made a second mental note to never fuck with the man's friends, if this is what he's like when angry. A pulse of killing intent was sent out from the older red-head, and Naruto felt a small chill run down his spine not unlike a cube of ice down the back.

_Scary…_

 

~~***~~

The chase continued well into the Land of Marsh, which made Naruto wonder if Roshi was as loyal to Iwa as they thought he was. Before they could contemplate it further, Roshi had stopped and Naruto had to latch onto the branch he was about to land upon. Behind him, Gaara had an easier time stopping, using his sand as a platform to come to a stop.

In front of them were three people. One of them wore crimson samurai armor all over his body, with an odd engine-like thing upon his back, emitting steam. That man had, mostly hidden by the metal kasa he wore, a Hitai-Ate signifying allegiance to Iwa. He was unconscious, and lay behind the other two.

Both wore black cloaks with red clouds.

Naruto's heart stopped as he realized who Roshi's friend was.

 _Another one._ Another one just like him.

And he was in danger of _having his Biju removed and die_.

Naruto wouldn't wish such a thing on anyone, no matter where they came from. So he reached behind him, pulling out his last two Kunai and holding them in a reverse grip. Behind Naruto, Gaara's sand deposited him upon a tree branch before swirling around him menacingly.

"Careful, Gaara. These guys are Akatsuki." Of course, Naruto didn't need to explain the enemy's allegiance, as the cloaks were a dead giveaway, but it never hurt to be sure everyone was on the same page. Roshi heard the comment and looked at the two contemplatively.

"Akatsuki, huh? Who hired you, then." It wasn't a question. The taller one, his head covered by a grey hood with a bandana and face mask to complete it, answered.

"To take capture are extract the Tailed Beasts from their hosts is the supreme order given from the higher ups of Akatsuki." The Taki missing-nin answered, his voice unnaturally gruff.

"Yeah!" the shorter, silver-haired man echoed, before Naruto had to duck in order to dodge a tri-bladed scythe, whose blades were a vibrant shade of red. It was connected by a chain-like rope that led back to the silver-haired Akatsuki, and it took a second for Naruto to realize who the scythe had hit, since Naruto had crouched down.

 _Gaara!_ Looking back, Naruto saw that he needn't have worried: Gaara's sand defense had stopped the scythe when it was mere feet from him. The red-head looked at the scythe in what appeared to be curiosity, even watching it as the silver-haired Akatsuki member called it back to his hand.

"Can I kill that man?" Gaara looked at Naruto, whose eye went back to twitching. _Again._

"Yes." Gaara adopted a _very_ disturbing smile, looking almost crazed.

"Fantastic."

~~***~~

Roshi stood, looking past his opponent, to the downed man on the ground past him.

"Why do you care for him? Your village doesn't seem to, if my intel stands to reason." His opponent said, looking for all the world as if he didn't really care what the answer was.

"While they may dislike him, that doesn't mean that I don't." Here Roshi smirked. "Besides, no one does that to my kid brother and gets away with it."

Roshi made several hand seals, ending on the snake. Suddenly, the ground between Han and Kakuzu split, lifting up and away until a great chasm divided the two.

"What a unique way to use Earth Flow Divide," Kakuzu said, looking behind him before turning back towards his opponent. "But that tactic won't work with me."

"Wasn't my point. NOW GAKI!" Roshi called, putting his hands on the Dragon hand seal, inhaling and breathing out a phoenix. The great creature was huge, easily seen from miles away, and while it was made entirely of fire, it gave off not heat. The mythic firebird spread its wings, letting out an unearthly screech. While Kakuzu was distracted by the blazing creature born of a jutsu he had never heard of, Naruto ran past him, heading up the incline, and was about to jump the chasm to ensure their target's safety when his hair, which had been slowly growing out, was snatched from behind and yanked, sending Naruto into a world of pain as he was flung directly into the giant phoenix bearing down upon Kakuzu. As this happened, a pulsating mass of the black-tentacle-threads appeared over Kakuzu's right shoulder, attached to the man from similar tentacle-threads coming from within the wide collar of his cloak, a blue bird mask facing the giant firebird.

The mouth of the mask opened and a piercing shriek was briefly heard over the ear-shattering screeching of the phoenix before it suddenly blew up in a mass of fire that spread up in the air, in pieces of flicking flames.

"GAKI!" Roshi called, and he was answered when Naruto came out from the mass of soot that coated the ground he lay upon, singed all over but otherwise okay, giving a thumbs up to denote the fact. He sighed, and Kakuzu appeared to smirk.

"That it?" He taunted. "I expected more of such a powerful jutsu, but it was more flash than show, wasn't it?"

Roshi didn't answer, instead opting to look up as a single flicker of a flame as it approached him.

"Not exactly." He replied, holding his hands out before yelling out to Naruto, "GET DOWN GAKI!"

He clapped his hands upon the flicker, and it exploded, barely missing Naruto as he went flat on the ground, while the explosion engulfed Kakuzu's entire form. The roar of the fire was so loud Naruto almost missed hearing a piercing screech before the explosion reached him.

~~***~~

Gaara appeared to be toying with Hidan, simply standing there as the man kept sending his scythe at him and failing to draw blood. He had one hell of a time studying how Hidan attacked; his patterns; the way he stood when launching the scythe in certain ways. He found it… odd, to say the least. This man was supposed to be S-Class, yet displayed nothing to show that he was deserving of such a title.

Suddenly, the (supposed) S-Class nin appeared to realize that injuring Gaara was futile, and chose to make several hand seals, which startled Gaara. He hadn't thought that the man, who had introduced himself as Hidan, would know ninjutsu, as the crazed man kept swearing that Gaara's defense was absolutely annoying. The hand seals ended on hare, and the man's skin began to become darker until it was completely black, save for the skin that had paled into white, mimicking the skeletal system. His entire body, meanwhile, became unnaturally gaunt, and Gaara thought that if the cloak were not there, then every single one of the man's organs could be outlined. As it stood, Gaara could see every beat of a pulse in the man's jugular. Picking up his scythe, it too began to change as soon as he made contact, the three blades becoming thinner, longer and closer together, until it looked like a single blade upon a pitch-black pole.

"Now I won't miss." Hidan laughed, and charged towards Gaara.

Their fight was stalled when an ear-splitting shriek wound its' way though the air, making both fighters look back and up in the sky to see a phoenix of fire. Hidan looked shocked, and suddenly realized that such a thing would never- could never come from Kakuzu.

While he didn't like Kakuzu, he was sort of fond of the man, who was a pioneer in immortality. And he couldn't dare stand to be partnered with someone else- the only reason he'd joined Akatsuki was because of his respect of Kakuzu.

Hidan moved to make sure his partner was okay when a wall of sand erupted in front of him, blocking his path.

"I do not believe our fight is over, as I have not yet killed you." Gaara looked livid. Since joining Uzumaki Naruto on his journey, all he'd done was follow the kid who, quite frankly, didn't appear to have a clue what he was doing. And yet…

He wasn't quite sure just what compelled him to go with the blonde, but he knew that he had to what it was. And the only way to know was to go with Uzumaki; to follow Uzumaki and learn from him just what it was to truly have bonds with another person- to care for them so much you would die for them.

Gaara wasn't sure if he had such a bond with Uzumaki. But that didn't mean he didn't want to have one.

And if having that bond meant dealing with Uzumaki's… quirkiness, then so be it.

He sent a single thought to his sand, coupled with a minute amount of chakra, and began to go on the offensive against the crazed, skeletal maniac.

~~***~~

Naruto got up, inhaled, and began coughing. The air was thick with the ash and smoke left over from that explosion and he yanked up his shirt, covering the lower part of his face while also providing a bit of a filter from the smoke hanging in the air and making his eyes sting. Feeling something wet on the side of his head, he found that his ears were bleeding, and the blood was sliding down, meeting with the blood that hadn't matted his hair down from the bleeding scalp.

"Roshi." He croaked out, his voice dulled from having his eardrums blown out. "Roshi! Ro-" He was cut off as a hand latched onto the back of his shirt, and _yanked_ , sending Naruto towards whoever had grabbed onto him, and he had a bad feeling about who it was.

He suddenly found himself up against a single person, and by the look of the black cloak covering the arm holding him in place, it was clear that he'd become a hostage.

There was a piercing shriek right next to his head, and he screamed in pain as a blast of air shot out, barely missing on blowing his head clear off his body and turning it into a bloody, gory mess upon the ground. The blast of air cleared the entire area in front of Naruto and his captor, revealing just how powerful it was.

What once was lush marshland was now what one would expect after an intense forest fire. The wet, muddy ground had dried up and cracked, ash and cinders laden upon the ground surrounding what few trees weren't reduced into piles of cinder or the ash hanging in the air.

Naruto was sent into the air, and given that the arm holding him had moved with him, it was clear that Kakuzu had jumped up. The grip on Naruto shifted, and he suddenly found himself pressed against an hard, shaped object hidden underneath the cloth. There was another shriek, and an explosion of air blasted all the ash and smoke out of the air, revealing Roshi, who had moved to cover Han and was now carrying him towards safety.

Naruto could feel that Kakuzu was angling to land in the way of Roshi's path, and sorely wished that he hadn't used up almost all of his chakra on keeping up with Roshi. His hands twitched to pull his last two Kunai from his pockets before remembering that he'd lost his grip on them when Kakuzu had stopped the first attempt acquisition the armored man.

Kakuzu landed, and Roshi stopped, glaring at the man.

"How adorable." Kakuzu sounded like he was taking some kinda perverse enjoyment in taunting the man. "You throw away the life of your little student in favor of saving your brother. It seems that Deidara was right about Iwa: you are tactless bastards."

"Don't you dare mention that maniac's name in my presence." Roshi growled. "Do you know what that bastard almost did to my family?"

"I don't give a damn _what_ he did to your family, hand over the Gobi Jinchuuriki before I turn your underling into bloody mist." Naruto felt the hard statue-thing move, and it felt like his stomach turned to lead as he realized what it was: another mask-thing, like the bird one that could fire deadly blasts of wind.

"Help." He croaked out, his hoarse voice not carrying very far, but had served its purpose for Kakuzu, as the mask pressing into Naruto's back started to open its' mouth. Tears rolled down his face as he began begging, futilely lifting his arms, his muscles having begun feeling the effects of overexertion and tugging on the arm keeping him in place. "Please." He whispered.

Roshi looked at him, his visage cleared of any emotion.

"Kill the boy. He isn't my student." Naruto felt his hope for surviving diminish drastically when Roshi said that.

_No… No!_

There was dark chuckling from his captor, and the mask shifted up and to the side as Kakuzu shook with laughter, before stopping and standing tall.

"Bad choice."

The mask against Naruto opened its' mouth.

There was a high-pitched whistling sound for the briefest of moments, before Naruto felt white-hot pain come from behind before it stopped.

~~***~~

Hidan's scythe swung, and Gaara's sand moved to intercept when it _went through the sand like it wasn't there at all._ And it wasn't the only thing to come out of the sand, as it appeared to drag several people from _within_ the thin defense of sand. Gaara was surprised, looking at the people, all of whom appeared vaguely familiar.

"You!" One of them cried, and through the throng came a single man. His violet-grey eyes were matched perfectly with his messy sandy-blonde hair. "Why didn't you die?"

Gaara was so shocked that he took a step back, and didn't notice when Hidan moved behind him, bringing his scythe into an upward slash straight through Gaara's gourd, sending dozens of people out and around Gaara. And suddenly Gaara realized where he'd seen all of them before.

They were the assassins his father had sent after him. The assassins he'd crushed into nothing with his sand.

"But it doesn't matter," Gaara's uncle, Yashamaru, said. "So long as I finally get to kill you, you monster."

~~***~~

The blast sent everyone back, and Kakuzu's dead body could be seen lying on the other side of the recently-made clearing. Roshi looked at the child who, by all rights, should be ash in the wind, if he was lucky.

Surrounding Naruto's entire body was what could only be described as a 'cloak' of red chakra.

A single chakra tail lazily moved behind him, the bubbling chakra appendage attached to Naruto's tailbone.

Remembering what the gaki had told him not even hours earlier, Roshi carefully set down his younger brother, moving slowly so as not to agitate the blonde into a potentially dangerous state of mind. Standing up, he faced Naruto.

"Hey." Naruto's head snapped in his direction, looking desperate. Looking confused. Looking scared.

And Roshi remembered that this was still a child. A trained killer, but still a child.

And children needed comfort and guidance.

"How are you feeling?" The question was simple enough, but it held a much deeper meaning: _Are you like you were before?_

"I feel… weird." He said, looking down at the red, bubbling chakra cloak covering him. Lifting his hand, he finally had the chance to marvel at how it seemed to act like a second skin. Splaying his fingers, he watched the cloak do the same, and took notice that the chakra-fingers ended in sharp points. _Like claws…_ Looking at his hand underneath the cloak, he saw that his fingernails had become pointed and… harder? He lifted his other hand and tapped one fingernail with the other, finding it was definitely harder- and thicker too. _Just like claws…_ Naruto wondered if any other parts of his appearance changed when he drew upon Kyuubi's chakra, but didn't have time to dwell upon it when he and Roshi heard dark chuckling come from across the clearing.

"So you were able to kill me." Kakuzu mused as he looked down at the cracked mask on his torso before narrowing his eyes. Suddenly the cracked mask started to shift, and the black tentacle-threads shown now that it was shattered began to shift and _pull_ , and the two Jinchuuriki were beholden to a brief look at the _thing_ that Kakuzu was. The shattered mask, which seemed to have been made as the likeness of a tiger, left Kakuzu's body, and the huge mass of tentacle-threads formed into a four-legged beast, holding that shape for a moment before it collapsed, the tentacle-threads turning into some kind of watery ooze, which soon seeped into the ground, leaving not trace that they were ever there except for the pieces of the mask it used to have. Kakuzu simply watched the whole thing happen before turning his attention back to the blonde he'd been holding hostage not even minutes before. "It has been a long time since someone managed to kill me. I'd be more impressed if I hadn't realized you were the other Jinchuuriki of Iwa. It seems that Kisame will be disappointed- you were his given target."

"He isn't Iwa's other Jinchuuriki." Roshi called, his visage darkening as he moved to stand as far from Han as he could. "I am."

And the ground underneath Roshi erupted like a geyser, spewing out molten lava as a column rose up above all others. And standing upon the geyser, his entire form was in a chakra cloak of his own. But where Naruto's was orange-red, Roshi's could be called the color of blood.

"Take my brother and get as far away from here as you can. Find you friend and keep Han safe." He called down to Naruto, who simply gave a small nod, using his newly-given speed to move to Han's side, picking him up and making to leave before stopping and looking back.

"I'll get him somewhere safe and come back for you. Don't you die on me." Roshi smiled, and Kakuzu swore that the lava geyser increased its' output.

"Wouldn't dream of it." Naruto left, and it was a few seconds later that Roshi's smile became a smirk as he locked eyes with Kakuzu. "And _you_ , my friend, shall become host to a little something I've been working on. Welcome to Hell's Playground."

And from the Geyser of lava, creatures started to stir.

~~***~~

Gaara looked around, shock and fear clear upon his face. He tried to use his sand to crush them, but it was to no avail- they just kept coming, as though the sand was never there. Backing up, he hit a tree, and could do nothing as the single Kunai his dead uncle wielded slipped straight through the sand and cut into his skin, drawing blood, before pulling back.

"Got you." A voice said from behind him, as Hidan sped past, swiping some blood to use in his ritual. Holding the small amount of blood on the blade of his scythe, Hidan lowered it to the ground and drew a circle, the tiny drop of Gaara's blood suddenly turning into enough to make a circle with a triangle within. Hidan stepped within the circle, and suddenly his skin began to inflate and return to how he looked before initiating the jutsu, while Gaara's began to thin out, his skin turning black while skeletal markings appeared over the prominent bones in his body. His gourd too, changed; becoming obsidian black. "Accept this sacrifice that I so humbly offer you, Jashin."

"What have you done to me?" Gaara's voice wasn't so much a yell as it was a shriek, and his eyes showed that he was almost hysterical.

"You have become the ultimate sacrifice one can make for the lord Jashin: death by those you killed. The greatest thing one can ever do in the name of the lord." Hidan looked smug, but he didn't count on one thing: Gaara's sand, which lashed out as Yashamaru went in for the kill, crushing the spirit's hand. "What the…"

Gaara suddenly regained his composure, standing still where second before he was shaking like a leaf.

"It seems that your jutsu has backfired upon you." Gaara stated, his voice calm once more. "And now I can finally free myself from the burden of all these kills. Thank you."

Hidan screamed in anger, but wasn't stuck in place, unable to move.

Gaara's black sand was sent out, crushing all who it came upon. For every spirit that Gaara killed, his pallor returned and the gaunt look he had garnered was fast disappearing, until he was back to his old self.

"What are you?" Hidan stared. No one had ever done that before. No one was that heartless.

Gaara stood there, watching his skin as it became his normal pale complexion once more before noticing that his sand hadn't changed back from the obsidian color Hidan's jutsu had turned it into.

"I am Kurosuna no Gaara, the one who will kill you."

Hidan did the only thing he could do, now that the jutsu was broken.

He ran, hoping that Kakuzu had gotten his damnable target to the meeting point.

~~***~~

Kakuzu stood, panting slightly and glaring at the man standing atop the geyser and simply watching as the Hell-beasts went after their target. He'd had to resort to using his three other masks, which served well to turn his Akatsuki coat into tatters upon his body, but was unnaturally efficient in destroying these creatures.

Burns marked his body, and he looked over them all before returning to glare at Roshi.

It seemed that this Jinchuuriki was much more dangerous, despite having a weaker Biju.

"Thanks for not killing him yet!" _Dammit…_ That blonde Jinchuuriki, the one who, it appeared, had humiliated Sasori, had returned.

"Is Han safe?"

"He's well hidden, if that's what you mean." The blonde replied, looking at Kakuzu and giving him a dark grin, fully prepared to attack Kakuzu before he noticed the Hell-beasts made of lava surrounding Kakuzu. "AWESOME! How'd you make those?" The blonde one's voice was filled with wonderment, which annoyed Kakuzu.

"It's something only I can do, gaki, now sit back and watch the fun begin." Kakuzu made another choice he never thought he would do again- retreat. He was obviously outmatched, and once he found Hidan, the two of them would hightail it out of there and into the nearest Akatsuki hideout.

It was pure luck that had Hidan returned from his own battle, which was quickly concluded as having ended the same as his, if the red-headed child that rejoined the group across from them was any indication.

"Hidan, we should retreat. This mission's obviously a failure." Any second now, Hidan would start going on about how retreating was weak and-

"I agree." _What?_ Kakuzu didn't show it, but he was stunned. _Just how strong was his opponent…_

Kakuzu left that though for another time as the Zombie Brothers of Akatsuki, for the first time together, retreated.

~~***~~

"Aww, I didn't get to kick any ass…" Naruto sounded dejected for a moment before turning to Gaara, and noticing his new black sand and gourd, with white markings upon it. "When'd _that_ happen?"

Gaara looked over his shoulder at what Naruto was referring to before looking back at his friend.

"My opponent performed an unknown jutsu on me, one that I have never seen or heard of before." Gaara looked away. "I do not wish to speak of it."

Okay…" Naruto said at length, before Gaara changed the subject.

"I did not know that you could harness one tail of your beast's power. When did this happen?" Naruto looked down and made an 'O' motion with his mouth.

"Sometime during the fight with Kakuzu." He said, before turning to Roshi. "I don't blame you for what you did. I'd probably do the same thing if I was in your position."

Before Roshi could reply Gaara gave his thoughts on the matter.

"I did not know you could be so mature, Uzumaki. When did _that_ happen?" Naruto turned to face Gaara's smirk, his face in annoyance and his eyebrow twitching. _Again._

"There are times I _can_ be sensible." Gaara responded with a shrug before turning to Roshi. "Do you know of somewhere nearby where we can recuperate? My fight was quite taxing, as was the journey here."

As Roshi began explaining that Takigakure was only a few hours run away, and that they were free to go there and resupply, Naruto heard none of it.

Naruto simply stood there, listening as the two red-heads conversed. While Gaara didn't appear to look it, he could tell when his friend was getting tired. And Roshi definitely appeared winded. It seemed that using such large-scale and destructive area jutsus were quite tiring on the elder red-head.

The two had been the most helpful in the fight, while all he did was get captured. Out of the trio, he was the most injured. It seemed that no matter what Naruto did, he was still too weak.

And Akatsuki was too strong.

It didn't matter where those two ranked in strength in Akatsuki; all that mattered was that they weren't the leaders.

They weren't the strongest.

And those two had almost single-handedly defeated three Jinchuuriki without breaking a sweat.

They needed to get stronger. They needed to work together. It was really only luck of the highest degree that they'd killed Kakuzu, no matter how brief a time it was.

And so, as the chakra cloak disappeared while Naruto lead the group to where he'd hidden Han, Naruto had made up his mind about one thing he would hold absolute.

The Jinchuuriki needed to band together in order to live the lives they deserved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realize that canon has made a decision involving Yashamaru, but I choose to ignore it.


	10. Takigakure

When Naruto woke up, he was being carried by a clone of Roshi.

How'd he know it was a clone?

It felt like he'd slept on the ground, and his entire body was sore.

And then he remembered what he'd done, and had to forcibly stop himself from moving too much. His entire body felt like it was on fire, and he tried to go back to sleep, but seemed that fate had other plans for him.

"Good that you're awake, kid. I'd like you to meet Han, my younger brother." Roshi said, and Naruto opened his eyes, blinking away the tears that sprang up from how bright it was before seeing the man he'd helped rescue very clearly tree-hopping next to the Roshi-clone with the help of the actual Roshi.

"Hi."

"Hello. I must thank you for aiding my brother in my safe retrieval, even though I had things under control." His baritone voice started dismissive and ended accusatory.

"Well excuse~ _me_ for helping." Roshi retorted stopping and looking at his brother.

"You were not helping, you were hindering. There is a difference, you know." Han stated matter of factly, which irked Roshi more, and soon the two were delving into an argument.

"Oh right." Roshi said mockingly, his eyes rolling dramatically. "I apologize for _not_ jumping in to save you when you were unconscious and on your way to your death."

"I accept your apology." Han blandly stated.

"That wasn't an apology, you ass!"

"Could've fooled me."

A childish argument, in Naruto's opinion, which quickly devolved into something you'd expect of small children, not two men in their mid-twenties and –thirties.

Naruto turned his head away from the embarrassing spectacle, and noticed Gaara- really _noticed_ Gaara, who looked- not exactly at peace, Naruto knew that much- content.

He blinked, trying to fully cope with the image of Gaara presented to him, before his brain stop-gapped in order to protect him from a potential mental breakdown. Better he take some time to get used to seeing Gaara with an almost wistful smile on his face.

It reminded Naruto of the few times he'd come across several older kids at the orphanage who'd been doing drugs- the faraway look in their eyes, the half-smile of pure bliss, giggling at random things while bursting out into tears at nothing, crying about their pet fish not wanting to be their friend anymore.

Naruto was scared. No, screw scared, he was somewhere between repulsed and freaked out to the extreme.

"What the Hell have you guys been smoking while I was out?" _That_ certainly got their attention, bringing Roshi and Han out of their ( _extremely_ ) childish fistfight and getting Gaara to look at him in surprise.

"I do not believe that we have been smoking anything, Naruto." Gaara stated, looking confused. _Confused!_ It was quite clear on Gaara's face- the furrowed eyebrows, the look of concern ( _Concern!_ ) and the half-frown.

"I'll believe it when I see it, Gaara." Naruto said, not missing that he'd been called by his first name. From Gaara. The guy who had kept asking Naruto if it was okay to kill someone.

"I am serious, Naruto. We have not been smoking any kind of hallucinogenic." Gaara didn't seem to understand what Naruto's problem was. Neither did Roshi or Han.

"Well, you two I can kinda understand, being brothers and all," He gestured dismissively at the two Iwa-nin, who appeared affronted at the jab. "But I don't get you." Here he pointed at Gaara. "Not even a day ago you were asking me for permission to kill, and you were… well, you. Now you look like one of the stoner kids from the orphanage. And let me tell you now, I _will_ kick your ass back to Suna if that fight with the Akatsuki guy turned you into one of those people."

"I was not aware that I was acting different." Gaara said, a sort of bemused look upon his face, which sent Naruto leaning more towards freaked out to the extreme than it did towards repulsed.

"What happened in your fight with that Akatsuki Guy?"

"I do not yet wish to talk of it." Gaara said dismissively.

"Alright…" Naruto said, before turning his head towards the brothers next to Naruto's Roshi-clone. "So, where we heading?"

"Takigakure." Roshi replied, extricating himself from the tangled mess of limbs that he and Han had made of themselves. "They've got a neutral treaty with the other Elemental Nations, so it's alright for Shinobi of different nations to go there to hash out their own peace treaties, or even do like we're doing: rest up and gather supplies."

"Good." Naruto said, and laid his head back upon the Roshi-clone. "And Gaara?"

"Yes?"

"Stop being so creepy and go back to your old way of being creepy." Naruto didn't know what made him say that, but that thought was lost when he realized just how comfortable the Roshi-clone was…

~~***~~

Naruto was shaken awake by some weird Taki-nin, his teal bangs held out of his face by a hair clip that matched his eyes' bright violet color. In the background, Naruto could see Roshi, Han and Gaara, all watching him for some- WHOA! As much as Naruto was a normal teenage guy, that didn't mean that he would tolerate other guys feeling him up in a pat-down.

"Look, sir, I'm sure you're a nice guy-"

"I'm a girl, you are cute and shall be my boyfriend." The teenage girl said, feeling up Naruto once more for good measure. He sent a glare over to the trio. Han and Roshi had the decency to look away. Gaara didn't.

"Is there a reason you allowed this girl to molest me in my sleep?"

"We needed a good laugh." Roshi answered, and got a glare in reply.

"And it appeared to be the best way to wake you, as all other attempts had failed." Gaara stated, sounding much more like his usual self.

"Besides, boyfriend. I rather enjoyed what I found." Naruto wasn't sure if it was possible for someone to die from blushing, but he felt that he was about to find out if he didn't do something fast.

~~***~~

"You're not a fun boyfriend." The girl, who had introduced herself as Fu, looked put out as Naruto tried to squirm out of her grip on him. Her presence had gotten the group into Taki quite easily, even if she acted like her fellow Taki-nin didn't exist.

"Never said I would be your boyfriend." Naruto replied, failing to get out of the grip she had on him.

"But you _are_ my boyfriend, Boyfriend." Fu said, her face looking extremely serene as she nuzzled Naruto's cheek. "And I just _love_ your tattoos!" Suddenly, she stopped nuzzling and instead chose to pinch his cheek before caressing Naruto's whisker-marks with one of her cocoa-skinned fingers. The action, he secretly noted with slight horror, turned him on somewhat.

"They're not tattoos, they're birthmarks. And I 'd really like you to not touch them." Naruto mumbled out, a pink tinge covering his cheeks.

"Why not, Boyfriend?" Fu sounded… playful. Naruto shuddered and cursed his luck, listening to the stifled laughter of Roshi and Han behind the two. He swore that he felt some kinda amusement coming from Gaara, and planned to get them back for laughing at his torment.

"Well, they're…" That last part came out as an incoherent bunch of sound, which made Fu ask him to repeat it. He mumbled again, and she told him to speak louder.

"They're sensitive and your rubbing is making me feel… stuff."

Roshi decided to screw indiscretion, and opted for outright laughter.

Fu, looked confused for a second, before understanding went through her face, and she gained a shit-eating grin before leaning in close and _licking_ Naruto's whisker-marks, dragging her tongue along each of the black lines. Naruto felt a stirring in-between his legs, something he hadn't felt before.

Han broke down laughing, and both brothers collapsed in a fit, their laughter going on until Gaara said something that made the two stop faster than the Yondaime Hokage's Hiraishin.

"I do not understand. What is the 'stuff' that Naruto is talking about."

Naruto took amusement at the revelation that the only people who could tell him what he was feeling were the very two who were mocking him seconds earlier.

_Payback's a bitch, ain't it…_

 

~~***~~

Unfortunately, the euphoria lasted until they reached the inn they were staying at, where Roshi was able to pull out enough ryo out of Naruto's blackened backpack to cover the cost of two conjoined rooms before saying that Naruto had to prepare if he was gonna take Fu out on a date that evening.

Ignoring Naruto's protests, he was tossed into Roshi's grip, who hoisted the blonde over his shoulder and led the way to their rooms.

"So," Roshi began, setting Naruto down upon one of the two beds in one of the rooms they'd just paid for ( _with my hard-earned money…_ ). "Before you start, I'm gonna explain to you- the both of you" Here he looked at Gaara "Just what the gaki was experiencing."

For some reason, a small part of Naruto's mind was screaming for him to run like a bat outta Hell, but he ignored it in favor of quelling his curiosity.

"You see, when a boy reaches your age, his body begins to change…" Roshi began, and Naruto paled once he realized just what was happening. His body betrayed him, staying frozen on the spot, so he had no choice but to listen. "For example, you'll find that hair starts growing in strange places…"

_Gods kill me._

 

~~***~~

Roshi was a professional.

And as a professional, he was able to move past his own reservations to get the job done. Once, during the Third Great Shinobi World War, he'd had to slaughter an entire platoon of fresh Genin, small children not older than 10 years old. He was able to push aside his emotions and killed them all. That's how much of a professional he was.

And yet he never once, in all his years as a Shinobi, had to give something as embarrassing as 'the Talk'.

He barely remembered receiving 'the Talk' from his older brother, and the extra embarrassment from giving it to Han some years after that.

But as embarrassing as it was being on the _receiving_ end of the talk, he found that it was just as, if not more-so, _giving_ the talk.

But Roshi was a professional, so he did what all exemplary Shinobi did in the face of such situations.

He repressed the hell out of his emotions for cathartic release later in life.

Usually, the cathartic release of all his pent-up emotions came out in embarrassing the hell out of whomever he saw first, but this time, the embarrassment part was set up _before_ the emotional repression, which would make it all worth it in the end.

So he continued his explanation of the baby-making experience, sometimes with jury-rigged visual aids, and reveled in the fact that it was gonna pay off when Naruto went on his date.

~~***~~

Naruto fidgeted.

Fu stood there, assessing him.

Fidget.

Stare.

An itch in his nose.

Stare.

The itch felt annoying, like a bug was dancing on his skin. But he didn't scratch it, for fear of angering the girl- no, the _woman_ in front of him.

And if there was one thing he knew about women, it was that they were the scariest thing on earth.

Fu kept staring at him, as if expecting him to- Oh. Right. He extended his arm, his elbow bent at just the right angle.

Fu smiled, wrapped her own arm around his and them proceeded to get obscenely close to him.

Naruto looked up slightly to get a better look at her face. While he may have grown a bit in the past month that he'd been wandering, the older girl still had a good few inches on him.

"So," She began. "Where we gonna go?"

"Ummm." Naruto stalled for time. This was his first time in Takigakure, and he had no idea of where the best restaurants were, nor of the best places to take the semi-crazed woman. "Well, I recently came into a small fortune, so-" The tactic worked as Fu began to gush about going to this fancy place called Ryujin Jakka before leading Naruto there.

~~***~~

Ryujin Jakka turned out to be one of the oddest places Naruto ever did see.

It was located in the roots of the giant tree, but inside wasn't at all what Naruto expected. There were fancy works of art upon the walls, which was fitting for the air of the restaurant. The entire place was a bright golden yellow, with intricate mosaic designs of famed ninjas scattered across the ceiling, which was reflected in the white marble floor.

All in all, it was the kind of place that Naruto normally wouldn't be caught dead in.

"Table for two, please." Naruto asked as the pair approached the placeholder. The man spotted the pair, and gave a small smile to Naruto.

"Yes of course." He answered, "And who will be joining you this fine evening?"

"This nice young woman…" Naruto answered, looking confused, and gesturing to the girl latched onto his arm.

"What 'nice young woman'?" The placeholder questioned. "All I see with you is a rabid creature, which must leave if you wish to dine here."

Naruto was shocked at the man's answer, before sudden understanding came across his mind as memories of villagers from Suna and Konoha flitted through his mind.

"Well, then I guess you won't have my services, if you aren't willing to serve all who come through those doors." Naruto answered, his rage quiet and controlled- for the moment. "Just know- I'll spread word of this to everyone I know."

"If you must." The placeholder sighed, before going back to scheduling where to seat the reservations.

"Aww, you said you'd take me somewhere special!" Fu whined, being all but dragged by Naruto as the two left Ryujin Jakka. "Besides I see plenty of tables where we can sit."

"I already said I won't eat where someone denies a customer service." Naruto answered, leading her outside and onto the emptying street. "Now, which one do you have?"

"One what?" Fu looked confused at Naruto's sudden question.

"I've seen people behave like that before- Hell, I practically had that happen to me several times!" Naruto was almost yelling at her by the end, and stopped when he saw the look Fu was giving him- like he was the dirt beneath her feet. "Like how you're looking at me right now."

Fu almost flinched, but she just looked at him haughtily.

"If you must know, I am the Jinchuuriki of the Nanabi no Kabutomushi- the Seven-Tailed Horned Beatle."

"Well, that makes my job much easier." Someone said from above them before Naruto found that he couldn't move properly because- _What the Hell!_

There was a white person growing from the two of them.

~~***~~

Roshi and Han stood a distance away as Naruto met with Fu and the two began their date. Or rather, Fu began dragging a despairing Naruto to their destination.

"Roshi." The voice was not unexpected, as both Iwa-nin had sensed Gaara follow them ever since they'd sent Naruto on his way.

"Yeah, kid?" Roshi said, somewhat distractedly as the brothers started following Naruto from a safe distance.

"I'd like to talk to you about something." There was an undercurrent of fear and confusion, which combined meant that Gaara wasn't quite comfortable with what they were about to discuss.

"I've already explained puberty and sex, don't expect me to help you get a girl."

"It is not that." Gaara said, sending a half-hearted glare at the older man. "I wish to talk to you about something I've been feeling ever since my fight with that Akatsuki member."

"This have anything to do with your attitude change?" Roshi said, leaving his brother to go on ahead and keep watch over the blonde gaki- and take notes on anything that could be useful, blackmail or otherwise. Gaara raised an eyebrow, confusion becoming more apparent on his face.

"I was not aware that my attitude has changed any."

"It hasn't really, but you keep having his look on your face, like you're really content." Roshi explained. "I'm guessing that that Akatsuki guy did something."

"Yes." Gaara took a breath, not sure how to properly explain. "He used some kind of jutsu, I do not know what it was, but it changed him. He became completely black, and had these white markings all over, like a skeleton. His entire body, too changed. Not just his skin. It became thinner, to the point where I could see the shadow of each of his ribs and could read his pulse from simply _looking_ at him.

"His weapon changed as well, the scythes becoming longer and closer together. He attacked me."

"And?"

"My sand acts as a defense. Nothing can get past it, but his weapon did, and brought with it… things."

"Things?" Here Roshi was the confused one, but he didn't press the issue, allowing Gaara to explain in his own time.

"His weapon went through my sand, and the countless people I've killed spilled forth." Gaara continued. "Leading them was the first person I killed- my uncle."

Roshi cringed slightly. While relations between him and his family weren't perfect, they weren't bad enough that they tried to kill him or Han.

"He was able to injure me, though it appeared to only be a glancing blow, which my opponent used to create this strange shape upon the ground that he stood within. Soon after, the changes to his body began reversing, and they happened to me instead."

"A curse jutsu." Roshi breathed. He'd only heard rumors that such things existed, and the closest he'd come to confirming their existence were curse seals.

"Perhaps, but it is what caused my sand to become the black that it is now, which I was able to use to kill the dead assassins." Gaara was finishing up his story, Roshi could tell, and remained silent. "As I killed them, I found that the changes to my body were disappearing, though my sand remained as it is. When it was done, I turned to the Akatsuki member and told him my name, and how I was to be the one to kill him, before he ran."

Roshi remained silent, as several things became apparent, but prominently was the fact that he had a fair idea of what had changed with Gaara.

"It sounds like you rid yourself of the burden of having killed all those people, though I assume that the original purpose was to weaken you enough so that you would be killed by those you yourself had killed."

"And how does that equate to my supposed change in demeanor, and this feeling I have within me?"

"Well, it means that you're at peace with yourself. What you feel inside is closure, I guess, and the fact that you've found somewhere you belong." Roshi was about to continue when he felt Han's chakra flare. "We're done here. Something's up with the gaki's date!"

~~***~~

Han, despite all outward appearances to the contrary, was a rather easy-going person. If someone took the time to get to know him, then they'd find out that he was rather kind despite the gruff, dutiful ninja persona he'd created for himself.

Which was why he was shocked when Naruto had, instead of choosing to mouth off at the placeholder (as he seemed like the type to do so), politely told off the man and left. Now, he was yelling at the girl, who revealed that she was a Jinchuuriki herself.

And then something quite strange happened.

White people had begun growing from the bodies of the two teens he was watching, similar to a fungus or some kind of parasite, and Han took notice of a _thing_ coming out of the ground as he jumped down to aid them in the attack, his steam armor quickly engulfing his entire form. He turned to face this new, mysterious opponent.

 _Thing_ was an apt description. Despite looking altogether human, the giant leaves on either side of him, which disappeared within the Akatsuki cloak were the most obvious telling feature that it wasn't human. The second most telling feature was that half of it's' body was a sort of greenish-white, whit the other side was pitch-black, yet both had yellow eyes.

The white side blinked at him in surprise, while nothing could be seen as defining features upon the black side outside of the eye, which was open wider than was humanly possible.

"Well, this is unexpected." The mouth moved on the white half, while the black half didn't so much as twitch a single muscle.

" **Not exactly, you imbecile. It's plainly clear that someone would notice. We just didn't plan for them to react so fast.** " A second voice said, and suddenly Han felt extremely uncomfortable, watching the creature in front of him while reaching down to rip apart the _things_ that were growing over Naruto and Fu.

As soon as his steam-covered hands touched the white fungus-people, they began to hiss and burn, trying to move away from his hands, which wouldn't relinquish their hold upon the creatures until they were completely removed from the two teens.

"That doesn't mean we have to _fight_ him, now does it?" The white side's yellow eye turned to look at the black side, and Han realized just where the other voice came from- both sides were two different people.

" **Of course not! This is why we should have waited until Kakuzu was able to give us back-up.** " The black half replied, and Han had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"Do you mean the masked one of your ranks?" Han questioned. "The one who hails from this village?"

"Well will you look at that." The white side mocked. "He knows who we're talking about." It paused for a second before saying "Hey. Wasn't he Kakuzu's target?"

" **Shit.** " The black one said.

"So you are also of this Akatsuki." Han said, looking calmly at the thing. "Then I cannot fend you off on my own."

And then he flared his chakra.

~~***~~

Naruto felt weak as Hell. The fungus-people had sapped him of all his energy, and his arms were kept apart, so he couldn't use any of his jutsu.

Wait.

Seal-less jutsu.

That's it.

As soon as Han ripped the fungus-person-thing off of him, he felt some of his chakra return, though it would still be a while before he was at full power again.

But it was enough.

Standing up, Han looked over at him, surprised.

"You are weakened." He stated.

"No shit." Naruto replied, one hand still on the ground as he crouched. "But that doesn't mean that I'm gonna miss out on this chance to kick some Akatsuki ass." He made a face as he stood up. "Besides, I didn't get to do anything in the last fight with them!"

Han chuckled, impressed with the blonde's priorities.

"What's this Akatsuki?" Fu said, getting up and leaning on Naruto for support.

"You don't know?" Naruto was surprised. He already figured that people like Gaara didn't know, and he suspected that Roshi and Han knew of Akatsuki, though most likely for different reasons. But he didn't expect Fu, someone who came from a neutral country, to have no idea of what Akatsuki was, considering that one of their members came from Taki. He internally sighed, and wondered if Konoha was a much different place than he thought it was, if they were the only place that knew of the organization and hadn't bothered to warn the Elemental Nations. "Akatsuki are evil guys who wanna remove our Biju to take over the world."

"Then what're we doing standing around when we could be killing them?" Fu gave him a dark smile before stomping her right foot down and pushing both fists forward with as much exertion as possible. The others were confused for only the briefest of moments before the ground itself rose into a spike where the Akatsuki member was, who dodged it.

"What the…" Naruto was shocked, and he looked to Han for an explanation, but it appeared that what Fu had done was something unknown to him also.

Fu, meanwhile, was doing her level best to kill the Akatsuki member, stomping one foot down, which sent a block of earth into the air, where she pushed forward with one of her wrists, her fingers curled into a fist, which sent the piece of earth flying towards the Akatsuki member, who dodged several of these before disappearing into the ground.

"Don't worry, we'll be back to get the Nanabi." The white side taunted as the Akatsuki member literally _melted_ into the ground.

And then Roshi and Gaara appeared, looking battle-ready.

"Took you long enough, you missed it." Naruto said, slightly pissed off. He _still_ hadn't been able to fight against an Akatsuki. He turned to Fu. "What the Hell was that jutsu?"

"That wasn't really a jutsu." She answered. "The Nanabi is really powerful with Earth Release, so much so that it was almost like it could move the very earth however it saw fit. I got that power from it."

"So it's like a Kekkei Genkai?" At her nod, he looked ecstatic. "Awesome!"

"Aww, I knew boyfriend would love it!" Fu said, once again latching onto Naruto's arm and rubbing against his whisker-marks, making him become extremely fidgety and his face incredibly red.

~~***~~

Leaving was a rather silent affair. Naruto and Gaara agreed that going east sounded like a good idea, while Roshi and Han prepped to return to Iwa- well, Han was gonna go back to Iwa, while Roshi was gonna continue to wander around the Land of Earth.

Naruto didn't want them to do this.

"I don't think that we should split up." Naruto said, once they were outside. He'd somehow convinced Fu to lead the group outside of the village, where they were preparing to go their separate ways.

"Oh, Boyfriend." Fu gushed. "I knew you liked me!"

"Not just us, Fu." Naruto replied. "Go ask Gaara about his sand or something, okay?"

"Mmkay!" She cheerfully replied before going and pestering the former Suna-nin about how he was able to work his sand. Naruto sighed and turned to the brothers.

"We shouldn't split up." Naruto was never one for subtlety, and he wasn't gonna start now.

"Now, gaki, as much fun as it was with you, we can't." Roshi replied, with Han hesitating before nodding assent. "We have our allegiance to Iwa, for starters."

"Screw the Hidden Villages." Naruto didn't quite know where that came from, but it felt like the right thing to say. After all, this entire speech was being played by ear, which was how he usually got people to side with him. "Before you crossed paths with them, did you ever hear or Akatsuki?"

"No, but-"

"But nothing. How can you protect your villages when they won't even tell you of threats to your lives?" Naruto's voice slowly rose, garnering the attention of Fu and Gaara, who were in the middle of discussing the powers their individual Biju gave them. "If another one of us hadn't appeared, then Han would be dead by now. Fu would have been captured."

"We'll find and help each other like we did before." Roshi said.

"And when that fails?" Naruto countered. "Face it, you won't be there to save each other every time Akatsuki comes for one of you, and their members seem to be given the Jinchuuriki they have an advantage against."

"You don't know that." Roshi countered, and it turned into an argument between him and Naruto, with Han finding himself standing to the side with Gaara and Fu, entering their conversation about Biju-given abilities.

"The one targeting me is the Uchiha Itachi, one of the greatest Genjutsu users in all the Elemental Nations." Naruto responded.

"So?" Roshi didn't get it.

"So~," Naruto drawled out, "I can't break Genjutsu to save my life."

"Then learn how to, gaki." Naruto was irritated at that point.

"Even if I did, he would still win. He can use the weird black flames that look to eat through anything." Naruto said, driving his point home. "He's the most well-rounded Shinobi you'll ever find, and it doesn't matter if I can use Kyuubi's chakra, he'll still win against me, like that Kakuzu guy did against Han and us."

Roshi paused, and Naruto took a second to catch his breath. Off to the side, the trio had foregone their conversation for a later time, now watching the argument.

"You're right."

You're damn right I'm right." Naruto said. "So you in or not?"

"I'm in." Roshi answered, his hand out to shake on it.

"Good. I'd've pestered you until you said yes if you didn't, anyway." Naruto grinned as he met Roshi's hand, and the two sealed the deal. "After all, who's gonna teach me nature manipulation?"

"Don't push it gaki."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, Naruto/Fu will be the pairing, although the romance won't be anything more than a minor subplot for now.


	11. Yondaime

"Again!" Roshi barked out, and the mass of blonds in front of him slammed their palms upon the other in the hopes of cutting through the leaf that each one of them held. He watched as one of them cheered, having made progress, before dispelling itself. The rest of the clones stopped for a microsecond before identical looks of determination overtook their faces as they learned from their dispelled comrade.

It had been almost two weeks since they'd chosen to follow the blond, his plan to have them protect each other sounding both idiotic and ingenious.

He didn't know which was worse- that the plan was idiotic enough to potentially work, or that it was ingenious enough to not fail.

In the time since then, they'd entered the Land of Hot Water, which was just devoid enough of life that they could suitably train without any outside sources finding them.

When Roshi asked Naruto to list all the jutsu he knew, the man was floored at how small the list was. No Hidden Village worth their salt would deliberately let a Jinchuuriki in their possession not be at least B-Rank in strength by the time they were the Naruto's age. Hell, Gaara was in the same boat as the blonde, and he was _still_ stronger!

Not to mention, Naruto had learned the identity of both of his parents, something all orphaned children desperately wanted to know all their lives. The fact that everyone he knew and trusted potentially knew the identity of his parents had caused a major change in the blond. He'd been quieter, almost somber at times, for a few days after they'd left Takigakure, before one morning the blond caused all of them to nearly have heart attacks at just how _chipper_ the boy had been. All of them, even Gaara, were afraid to find out what had changed in the boy's mind, but Roshi had a hunch at what it was.

The boy was bottling up all his emotions.

There were five stages of grief: Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. While these were mostly used when describing coping with the death of a loved one, they were also quite apt in the description of how a person copes when their entire life has been upended.

And he suspected that Naruto was still in the first stage, despite all outward appearances to the contrary.

Also, the blond appeared to be quite dismissive of two of the jutsu he knew: Toad Summoning and Rasengan- both widely known by their use by the Yondaime Hokage. Roshi knew that continued repression would lead to horrible things, maybe even having the blond snapping and becoming the very creature his peers thought of him when he was little.

But he wouldn't approach the blond- rather, he'd wait until the blond approached him, and would council the boy as best he could, based upon his own experiences with his family.

And if given a chance, he would change so many things that had happened to his own family- things he'd said, things he'd done.

And it appeared that he had the chance, with Naruto.

Roshi was snapped out of his musings when he noticed that all the clones had briefly stopped.

"Again!" He snapped out, watching as the clones went back to work.

~~***~~

Fu stood in a large clearing, the ground around her devoid of any life, while the dry forest threatened to encroach upon the her spot. Her entire body was tense, though the rigid way she held herself was the only way that one could know that she was prepared for battle.

There was a single sound amids the quiet that her fight was producing- the slight thumping of a person landing upon the ground.

_There!_

She slammed two open fists, connected at the wrists, towards the sound, sending a square-shaped piece of earth shooting out right where the thump had emanated from.

There was a curse before the wind brought a wisp of smoke out from the spot hidden among the sparse greenery.

_Damn..._

She pulled her arms back in and returned them to her side, waiting for the next telltale sign of her opponent's location.

~~***~~

Naruto was barely winded, though his lungs were beginning to feel the ache of exertion. That last attack had been close.

Too close.

Thankfully, he was able to make a clone some distance away and Substitute with it just as the attack hit.

Had his jutsu been any slower, he'd have been hit, and the battle lost.

Taking stock of his situation, he was able to spy on his opponent, seeing her in that same stance as before- rigid with her arms by her side, fingers curled and ready to take down any opposition.

Flipping through his recently gotten weapons' pouch, he saw that he had several yards of ninja wire, a half-dozen Kunai, along with a few explosive notes.

Suddenly, an idea came to his mind, and he knew exactly what to do.

~~***~~

Fu stood, waiting, when suddenly there was a snap, and from the trees came dozens of Naruto's, each armed with Kunai.

She gave them no time to change their direction by bringing the side of her right foot in a wide circle around her, turning the surrounding ground, save for the circle around her, into mud, which ate up the clones as they landed, and shifted into a wall surrounding her to defend against the Kunai, which were sent straight back at them, causing them all to dispel.

Suddenly, a Naruto appeared from behind her, and the ground beneath him split before the two halves slammed together, crushing anything and everything between them.

Fu harshly threw both of her arms wide out, sending the two halves reeling away, to show that nothing but the mud that topped them.

_Sneaky bastard..._

She crossed her forearms, palms down, before swinging them upwards, creating a pillar of rock that allowed her full view of the area.

Two Kunai flew out, seconds too late to hit her, embedding themselves within the side of the pillar, and Fu resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Naruto was so predic-

The Kunai exploded.

The pillar crumbled, toppling.

There were several glints of metal from all over, and suddenly Fu found herself bound by Ninja wire, laying upon the ground with the shadow of her opponent standing over her.

"Yield." Naruto said. Fu was silent in reply, and suddenly she lost all color, becoming an earthen duplicate of the real teen. Naruto reeled back in shock. Where-

WHAM!

The two halves of earth closed upon the boy within a second.

"Gotcha." Fu said, stepping forth, and leisurely taking her time in heading over to the earthen coffin holding her opponent. With an almost casual wave of her hand, the two halves split apart, revealing that they'd once again caught nothing. Fu readied herself.

The attack came from the left.

She blocked a roundhouse to the head, following up by slamming her open fist into the solar plexus of her opponent, knocking the wind out of him, which allowed for her to bury him up to the head in an earth pit that she created and filled once the boy was securely in it.

"Yield." Fu said, pulling out a Kunai and holding it in a position that would best allow for her to place the finishing blow. Naruto sighed, and conceded the match in her favor. Fu warmed up, letting Naruto go and even helping him up as he tried to walk off the debilitating blow to his torso. "That was smart of you, to take down the pillar and capture me in the chaos of it's destruction. Smarter still to send a clone to confirm the take-down instead of doing so yourself."

"Thanks." Naruto said when he'd gotten enough of his breath back. "I wasn't positive I'd really gotten you, so that's why I sent the clone, and hung back just in case."

"Precisely. You are starting to think like a real Shinobi- prepping plans and back-up plans, setting traps, confirmation of target elimination." Fu smirked, and started to snuggle up against Naruto, who had since learned that getting her to stop doing such things was pointless.

"Hey, why don't we go see how Gaara's doing with his training." Naruto suggested, and was internally grateful for the platonic friendship the girl had made with the red-headed teen- even if it still gave him the creeps. Fu smiled, back to her cheery self.

"That's a great idea!" Suddenly Naruto regretted making the suggestion, almost losing his right arm as Fu started dragging him in the direction that Gaara was training.

~~***~~

Gaara stood by himself in a clearing similar to the one that Naruto and Fu had trained at. He stood like he normally would when using his sand, except there was a large difference between those times and now.

He did not have his gourd.

As Gaara stood impassive, three beings stepped out from behind the shrubbery, making their way towards him.

The Irukaume were quite similar in build to the Gobi, with the sole exception of how their horns protruded from their heads- and the number of tails they had. But it wasn't the horns that made them deadly- they hardly used them except for when charging an enemy. No, what made them deadly were their tails, which were similar in build to bull-whips, snapping dangerously, threatening to snap the necks of their prey, break the spine, and often cleave their prey into two- as the Gobi had become known for using it's tails to cleave mountains in half, just to obliterate the towns lying at their base.

The trio were very clearly steam creations of Han's if their almost wispy forms were any indication. Steam blew off of their horns, out their nostrils, from their mouths, even a contrail of steam could be seen from every crack of their tails. And they were stalking Gaara, who hadn't moved- hadn't even acted like he'd acknowledged their presence.

They charged, moving forth with an almost inhuman speed.

Gaara still stood, impassive.

They approached the teen, their tails whipping about in anticipation.

Gaara didn't even so much as twitch.

They got within feet of him, their horns ready to impale the teen.

Gaara _moved._

Two of the Irukaume exploded, while the third was sent flying back.

There was no indication that Gaara had ever been standing where he was- except for the two clouds of steam that were once Irukaume. He now stood to to one side of the clearing, watching as the single Irukaume he'd failed to obliterate get up, looking murderous. Suddenly, where there were once two steam-clouds, now stood two Irukaume, looking just as muderous, if not moreso, than the one that had survived the mysterious explosion.

Gaara stepped forward, his skin rippling an earthen brown for a split second, before he moved to engage the trio in real combat.

"Enough." The baritone voice came from the part of the clearing that the Irukaume had hailed from, and out of the shadows of the trees came Han, what little of his face covered by the metal hat he wore. The trio ran towards him, almost acting as if to attack him, before exploding into steam inches before hitting him, steam which was sucked up greedily by the armor covering his body. "You are getting better at transforming the dirt beneath your feet into sand, and the way you hide it by creating that second skin is remarkable. However, you need to learn to do so while on the move, otherwise your opponent will get the better of you. Not everyone allows for their opponent to turn the situation to their advantage."

"I am trying my hardest to create sand out of the ground beneath my feet, but it is very difficult to do, and I would say that it would be impossible for me to do so in the heat of battle, no matter how skilled I become." Gaara replied, looking as impassive as ever, and the two were interrupted by the arrival of Naruto and Fu. The two made for an odd impression, but Gaara rather enjoyed their company- Fu was able to appease him intellectually while Naruto was able to help him become better acquainted with his emotions, making for an odd combination.

At first, Gaara wasn't sure what to think of the teal-haired girl, until she'd provided him with one of the more intellectual conversations he had the pleasure of having since joining the journey with Naruto, and he had to admit that he saw a kindred spirit in the girl.

"Heya, Gaara!" Fu yelled from several yards away, with Naruto doing the same.

But that didn't mean that he wanted Naruto and Fu to have children. Quite the opposite, in fact.

The Elemental Nations would never survive such a thing.

"Hello." Gaara intoned, nodding his head in their direction. As the couple walked towards them, Naruto briefly became unfocused, signalling that another one of his clones as dispelled. "I presume that your spar ended with Fu winning."

"That's correct." Fu smugly said, and Naruto spent the better part of that smug look with his shoulders haunched and his head hung low, before straightening up.

"At least I'm getting better!" Naruto responded with vigor, looking like he'd come out the victor. "I nearly able to capture you this time."

"While that is also correct, it does not mean that you won- It just means that you're learning." Han answered, stopping the potential argument before it started. "Which is the entire point of our stay here in the Land of Hot Water.

"Now that your training has ended for the day, we can find my brother and see where to go with your training from there." Han concluded, jumping into the trees and heading towards the the forest area where Roshi was observing the group of clones, the trio of teens following closely behind.

~~***~~

Roshi stood on a tree branch, overlooking the mass of blonds. There was an almost inaudible grunt echoing through the area each time the clones simultaneously slammed their palms together over the leaf they were to slice through with Wind Chakra. As it stood, they could cut through each leaf about halfway, so Roshi had had them start over with a new leaf after each try, making the surrounding greenery much sparser than it had been before. Suddenly there was a cry of joy, followed shortly by a poof as the one that had made progress dispelled itself so that the others could learn from it. Suddenly, all of them were scrambling to get a leaf from the trees above, the movement so haphazard that it made Roshi close his eyes for a second, lest he get vertigo. When the sound of the clones scambling stopped Roshi opened his eyes, blinking away the few tears that dotted his eyes from the sudden intrusion of light, and he took in the usual sight.

The clones stood stock-still, their right hands raised above their left, which held the leaf. Their eyes were closed as they slowly breathed in and out, and Roshi, if he reached out with his senses, could feel the build-up of Wind Chakra from each of them- easily enough for the gaki to start the next part of training.

And then Roshi realized the crux in his plan.

He didn't know of a place where they could effectively find a secluded waterfall.

Iwa was too far off, and even then, they'd certainly be suspicious of the sudden return of their missing Jinchuuriki, not to mention the reaction the three other Jinchuuriki would raise from their presence alone.

Kumo was mountainous enough to safely hide the group, but the only water sources they had were lakes and underground rivers, no waterfalls.

They were certain to find a waterfall to the south, in the Land of Fire, but it couldn't provide the safety and security they needed for their training methods- not to mention how bad it would look for Iwa's two Jinchuuriki to suddenly be spotted within the Land of Fire with three other Jinchuuriki.

He and Han, while not on good terms with the rest of their family, did not wish a war because of their actions.

This left only one choice which, while risky, held the greatest potential as shelter from Akatsuki and outside forces.

The Land of Water.

Its' civil war coupled with the Bloodline Hunt would leave entire towns, perhaps even a few islands, void of any other life, making it the best place for them to conduct their training. However...

Kiri was led by a Jinchuuriki, meaning that if they were found out, the Yondaime Mizukage himself would appear to depose of them.

But they'd have to take that risk, because if a rebellion could hide it's forces within the Land of Water, then the group of Jinchuuriki could too.

Roshi's musings were brought to a halt as one of the clones threw their leaf- correction, two halves of a leaf in the air, shouting in triumph before it was dispelled by a nearby clone. The sudden influx of memories made them freeze, before they snagged fresh leaves (once more, Roshi closed his eyes to stave off potential motion sickness from the living optical illusion that were infighting clones). They didn't even acknowledge that they hadn't frozen in place for a second, instead slamming their palms together, slicing the leaf in each of their hands in half. There was silence throughout the clearing as the mass of clones took in what they did.

And then they erupted in cheerful shouts, pumping their fists in the air at their accomplishment. The celebration continued for several minutes before they all dispelled, and Roshi resisted the urge to groan- they were under strict orders not to do a mass dispel unless their creator was standing next to him!

"AWESOME!"

The shout from behind him nearly had him fall into the giant cloud of smoke, which was quickly dissipating into the air. Thankfully, he was a Jonin, meaning that Naruto, who had yelled from directly behind him, would never know that he got the jump on a veteran Jonin.

"Yes, it is, I suppose, 'awesome'." Roshi said, straightening up and not turning around. He had to supress his laughter at what he assumed the gaki's reaction was to him having known of the blond's location the entire time. Turning to face the child, he saw the rest of the group present and made a single realization- most of them would have to change their appearance.

Except for Han, who wouldn't- _couldn't_ part with his steam armor.

But that didn't mean that they couldn't do without a change of clothing...

"I know where we're gonna go next for your training." Roshi said with finality. "So tell me, do any of you get seasick?"

~~***~~

It was later that day that they found most of the group, sans Han, who had gone ahead to get their tickets on the next ferry into the Land of Water, exiting a clothing store.

Naruto's attire hadn't changed much, having grown rather fond of the color palate that the ANBU had left him when he'd been abandoned. He now wore dark green pants, open-toed boots that better fit him, and a burnt-orange zip-up hoodie over a black tee. In his shopping, he'd also gotten several extra pairs of the pants and tees in grey, black, the same forest green and an earthen brown. His new look had been greatly liked by the group- especially Gaara, who had thought that Naruto would search for something similar to his old neon-orange jumpsuit. Naruto's eyebrow had returned into its' habit of twitching.

Fu had gone a bit more radical, picking out her clothes in an earthen color: a flowing skirt that perfectly hid her legs, yet did not disrupt her style of Taijutsu. Upon her feet were a pair of silken slipper-shoes, which she rather liked for their comfort and how they allowed her to feel the earth beneath her feet. Joining the skirt was a flowing long-sleeve halter top, though her chest was covered by a piece that accentuated her form, making Naruto have all sorts of uncomfortable problems when Fu sauntered over to him for his input.

Gaara had completely changed, wearing a clingy long-sleeve in a dark crimson, which was covered with a muffler-type scarf and joined by black pants and the basic sandals the average ninja wore. The excess length of the scarf was used to wrap around Gaara's midsection and the middle of the gourd, attaching it to the teen.

But where the three teens could pass as any other teen if someone were looking for them, Roshi was had garnered the oddest looks from his three charges.

"I like it, and it's not like it'd make me any less conspicuous than any of you." Roshi defended of his outfit, which was eerily reminiscent of the battle wear that the Shodai Hokage wore, but wasn't as armored in the chest as the Shodai had been.

The three teens sighed, and decided to give in. After all, what use was it arguing with someone like Roshi, who was so stubborn that, on the way into town, he'd insisted that they hand over their Hitai-Ate- something that Naruto felt a pang of guilt and hurt when he remembered that he didn't have his own to hand over, before surprise overtook as it turned out that Gaara had left his back in the desert outside of Suna.

Truly it was a sight to behold, when several Jinchuuriki- four from three of the Greater Hidden Villages- let their Hitai-Ate, the one thing that signified that they were actual people where they came from, be melted into slag by Roshi's hand and left buried under several feet of well-traveled forest.

~~***~~

The mid-afternoon sun shone high in the sky, alighting everything it gazed upon. Down in the open water, the ferry had just set sail, heading for the nearby island of Wabisuke. Roshi gazed over the maps that he'd gotten hold of when going through the gaki's backpack.

_From Wabisuke, we can hitch a ride to past this one town I know is abandoned- Hyorinmaru. The Yuki clan was one of the first to be widely known to completely die off in the Bloodline Feud, and the town they occupied has long since been left to rot. We should be okay staying there for a while._ Roshi glanced about, seeing what was going on around him as he rolled up the map. There weren't that many other people on this exact ferry, which meant that it was very easy to spot where everyone was and what they were doing.

Fu was currently flirting with an obviously flustered Naruto, and the couple were consoling Gaara, who had never before been on a boat and was laying upon the deck trying to stave off the seasickness. Han was resolutely standing off to the side, having never liked being around crowds of people, and was silently watching the other people aboard the seafaring vessel.

Roshi turned from his spot, looking out at the great expanse of ocean they were surrounded by. Having participated in the Third Great Shinobi World War, he'd traveled all over the Elemental Nations, and there was little that he hadn't seen- except for the ocean. Iwa's warfront had never made it that far, and his travels were limited to within the Land of Earth and it's adjoining countries.

So it was with little fanfare that Roshi garnered his first look at the ocean, the Land of Water, and let himself be victim to the slow rocking of the ferry in the surf.

And then, in the distance, there was an explosion.

~~***~~

"Come on, Gaara. I know that you don't feel all that good, but it's a surefire way to get back to your old self again." Naruto's smooth voice cut through the air, making Gaara's head feel like it was going to implode on the pressure he felt. And the nausea didn't help either.

Perhaps this was what all those people had felt upon themselves as he'd encased his sand around them, squeezing and crushing until they were nothing but microscopic stains upon the surface of each grain of his sand.

The nausea came back with a vengeance, and Gaara felt like doing something he'd never done, or seen before: vomiting.

Granted, the novelty of this profound moment in his life was tempered by how his entire body felt like it was exhausted, his muscles aching by the sheer act of existing.

Turning his head towards the source of the ironically grating voice, Gaara mustered forth the energy to give Naruto one of his more menacing glares, hoping against hope that it would give the shaggy blond enough pause to stop talking.

"Your voice makes my head feel like it's going to explode. Please be quiet." And if the glare didn't work, then the pleading would.

Hmm, another new experience for Gaara- he'd never really had to plead before meeting Uzumaki Naruto.

As the conversation died down, they were left in silence, which really helped Gaara get into a meditative state in the hopes of gaining control and getting past his seasickness. It was working quite effectively, and he was getting over the last vestiges when there was an explosion in the distance.

~~***~~

Turning around at the sound, smoke started to rise in the near distance, Naruto felt the ferry turn towards the plume, in the hopes of finding out what had happened, and if there were any people that needed rescuing.

To his side, Fu had joined him in looking expectantly at the smoke cloud, and Gaara was slowly coming out of his meditative position to see what was going on. Around him, the dozen or so other passengers had come over, perhaps to see if they could spot anything or anyone.

"See anything, gaki?" Roshi inquired from behind him, and suddenly the teens were joined by the two brothers, who were slightly tensed, as if preparing to jump in the water- or fight.

"Not yet, but we're bound to see something soon." Naruto answered, and no sooner had he said it was there a figure running over the water towards them. Naruto squinted to get a better look, and saw that the person was wearing a uniform exactly like the kind that Haku had worn when he was posing as a- "Kiri hunter-nin."

The quiet whisper of who that lone figure was set the entire group of Jinchuuriki on guard, and they each prepared for the battle that was to come.

And then the hunter-nin threw off his mask, abandoning it to sink into the depths of the ocean, before removing the gi, leaving him in the standard Kiri Jonin attire. As he reached the side of the ferryboat, he reached up and yanked off his Kiri Hitai-Ate, dropping it so that it would join his hunter-nin mask at the bottom of the ocean.

So shocked were the Jinchuuriki at this turn of events, they almost missed the sight of a half-dozen figures giving chase to the man, appearing on the boat and stopping him from continuing onwards. Five of the six men were in full Kiri hunter-nin garb, while the lone remaining man, about as tall as Naruto, was completely different.

Afterall, it isn't everyday that you see the Yondaime Mizukage in person.

"Stop this foolishness, Utakata." the Mizukage said, his voice clipped and extremely soft, yet carrying through the air as though he'd spoken as loud as he could.

"I'm not stopping anything, Yagura." the newly named Utakata answered, getting into an odd battle stance and pulling out a long, thin pipe. "I've waited for this day ever since I was appointed your to your personal guard. Nothing you can do will stop me from defecting."

"Very well, then." Yagura answered, stepping back. His next sentence was quite clear to all aboard the deck. "Take him down, but do not kill him. We need the Rokubi to stay within the grasp of Kirigakure."

"But sir-" the lead hunter-nin started to inquire but was silenced with a single look.

"Once he is safely back in Kiri, we will remove the Rokubi and implant it in a younger, more malleable vessel. He will die in the unsealing, so you need not worry." Yagura's clipped tone had a hint of malice within, and he turned his head to the man, giving him an almost genial smile, if it didn't promise a painful death. "Is that clear, commander?"

"Crystal, sir."

"Then what are you waiting for?" The smile didn't disappear until the squad moved to take down Utakata.

~~***~~

with growing anger that he prepared to attack the man- Mizukage or no, none shall talk like that about a Jinchuuriki while Uzumaki Naruto lives and breathes.

He pulled out a Kunai, prepping it with the cutting force of his Wind Chakra, before whispering a plan of attack to Roshi. Naruto wasn't sure if the man heard it, but he was already sending an armed clone to attack the Mizukage, while several more surrounded the man. The Naruto clone barely made it near Yagura when the man spun around on his heel, his one hand in a half-Ram seal and extended out before slashing upwards, rending each and every Naruto clone in two. They all exploded into dust. And then Yagura took hold of the larger hook on his staff, yanking it out so that the smaller hook would rip out the throat of the real Naruto, who was descending upon the man from directly above with chakra-enhanced Kunai.

The attack almost succeeded, had Han not swiftly moved to block the attack and yank Naruto away from the man.

Naruto, however, was almost shaking, though with excitement or fear not even he knew.

"Stay back, child." Han said, shifting Naruto so that he could hold the blond better. Yagura gave chase, and the fight with the Yondaime Mizukage moved out into open sea. "This is not a fight you can simply go into without a plan."

"But I had a plan." Naruto argued as he was set upon the water's surface.

"And it was about to get you killed." Han stated, before the two were forced to separate by the cleaving _wall of wind_ that split the ocean in two for a few short moments. "Thankfully, I have a better plan." He called back to the blond teen, who grimly nodded his head.

"I'll wait." Naruto called back, before he was eviscerated by the larger hook on Yagura's staff. Han looked on calmly, as Naruto's body dissolved into dust that was consumed by the ocean beneath them. Yagura looked around, and saw Naruto off in the distance. He moved to take down the child before there was a sharp snap, and Yagura was surrounded by dozens of steam-created Irukaume.

"He is not the one you should worry about." Han intoned towards the short-statured Mizukage. "For your fight is not with him, but me."

With an almost careless wave of his hand, the Irukaume converged upon Yagura.

~~***~~

Roshi, Gaara and Fu stood on the deck, the only things keeping the five hunter-nin from taking down their former comrade.

Looking about, he took stock of their situation. Fu was a machine. Her seemingly constricting clothing worked especially well for her, and her Taijutsu was almost deadly in it's effectiveness, which the hunter-nin quickly learned, having sought to take her down with Senbon, which Gaara had stopped by extending his black sand out and around the two, and they both took defensive positions over the injured man, Utakata, if Roshi heard right. Utakata had been mercilessly beaten down by his former comrades, and they appeared to be prepping to deliver a fatal blow when the trio had stepped in, following the basics of Naruto's plan, which Roshi had to admit was ingenious.

Roshi himself was doing well against the hunter-nin, having resorted to using his aresenal of Fire Jutsu and what little Lava Release techniques he could do, which had sent them reeling back, muttering about a possible relation to a Terumii clan. Since that revelation, he'd been able to push them on the defensive, and given that they knew what the Jinchuuriki looked like, along with what a few of them could do, it left him with no choice.

The hunter-nin had to die.

Roshi readied himself, settling into a Taijutsu stance he never thought he'd ever have to use.

The stance was somewhat similar to Fu's Taijutsu, but he held himself looser, allowing his movements to be faster, stronger, more powerful.

"I hop y'all are happy." Roshi groused. "Because what you're about to see is the most amazing Taijutsu ever created."

And Roshi struck, both fists slamming into the first man, who _exploded_ as a mass of molten lava rent through his torso.

The second man was felled by a heel-kick upwards, his entire head exploding into globs of molten lava. The man's spasming body flew back, landing on the far side of the deck.

While this happened, two of the final three went towards the felled Utakata, but never reached their target, as both were held in place by Gaara's sand while Fu used her Taijutsu to crush their ribcages.

The final man appeared behind Roshi, and with a well-aimed Senbon, paralyzed the man. The same happened to Fu, and the man tried to do so to Gaara, only for condensed balls of sand to shoot straight into and through the man.

Gaara stood, silence permeating the air as he walked over, reaching down to pull the Senbon out of Fu before heading over to do the same to Roshi.

The pair of fighters looked at each other before looking at Gaara.

"So what do we do with the bodies?" Gaara's simple statement had _Roshi's_ eye start twitching, the action making Fu snicker while heading back to Utakata, whom she now took a good look at, before turning on her heel in a huff.

In the distance, there was a huge explosion, and the trio looked over to find themselves cast in the shadow of the Sanbi.

~~***~~

Naruto had barely been able to comprehend just what had happened. One second, the sea was covered in a horde of Irukaume, and the next they'd all been obliterated, with Yagura up in the air preparing to send another one of his slicing air walls at Han, who merely turned the sea itself into a giant steam Irukaume, who took the blow.

From there, the fight had been one the likes of which he'd never seen before. Han had followed up the giant Irukaume with string of deadly whips, driving Yagura on the defensive. At that point, Yagura had released a killing intent that Naruto found immensely familiar- that of a Biju.

Han wasn't fazed, and had even released his own Biju chakra in retaliation.

After that, it was a blur, but Naruto knew this for sure- Yagura had _become the Sanbi itself._ When that happened, Naruto found himself in Han's hold once more, and standing atop the Yagura-Sanbi, watching in horror as a giant, swirling ball of dark chakra appeared in front of the Yagura-Sanbi's face.

Naruto's eyes followed the line of sight for the Yagura-Sanbi, and a heavy piece of lead seemed to drop into the pit of his stomach.

It was aiming at the ferry.

Han's hand stretched out, and a similar ball made an appearance in his palm, which made Naruto realized two things.

The Rasengan was derived from this 'Biju Ball'.

Han was going to obliterate the Yagura-Sanbi's head.

And then there was a pulse that shook the air, making Han release his concentration on his smaller 'Biju Ball', sending them flying back several feet.

Time seemed to stop as Yagura-Sanbi's own Biju Ball imploded.


	12. Children of Jinchuuriki

The seas were tumultuous, the waves spreading out in giant ripples away from the point of impact, many colliding with the waves already heading towards their destination, cresting in gigantic geysers flying high in the air, the water shimmering in the late afternoon sun. This, combined with the blue-purple lining the pure-white of the clouds in the sky, made for an almost picture-worthy scene.

Yagura surfaced, gasping for air, his visage one of shock and horror.

 _Those ninja- the boat- the boy!_ Yagura looked around, trying to stay above the surface of the water, despite the heavy weight of his hook-staff threatening to pull him down into the depths. Around him, the water roared, screaming it's ethereal call as waves collided with each other, drowning out all other noise- _there!_

In the near distance, struggling to keep the unconscious Jinchuuriki out of the water with a clone, was the blonde teen who'd attacked him. _Solid, so it could be a water clone._ Yagura thought as he remembered that he was a ninja- no, he was a Kage, and as such-

Yagura quelled that train of thought. He'd been controlled for the majority of his reign, he was not deserving of that title anymore. Not after the things he'd been forced to do while under that monster's control.

Placing his hands upon the water's surface, Yagura got to his feet, moving to help the child who'd forced him to do something he hadn't had need to in almost a decade- draw upon the full power of his Biju. It was the massive amounts of Yokai- the proper term for Demonic Chakra, something only a select few knew- that had broken the control that accursed man had put Yagura under. And because of that, Yagura was indebted to the child, who'd done nothing more than provoke his Jinchuuriki friend into fighting his kin in order to save-

Yagura stopped his ascent, his blood freezing in his veins.

Utakata.

He wasn't sure if those hunter-nin would go easy of the Rokubi Jinchuuriki, for while the teen was the grandson of the Sandaime, Utakata had never been on good terms with the man. Their fights decimated Kiri worse than any of the Shinobi World Wars had done, even moreso than the attack of the Kaguya, which had sparked the entire Bloodline Feud. It had taken a lot of political power to get the people not to call for the teen's death when it was announced that the Sandaime was retiring to his family's compound in the northern edge of the Land of Water.

But then Yagura remembered that, out of the detail of hunter-nin that had been tasked with protecting him while he traveled out of village to renegotiate the trade deal with the Land of Hot Water, Utakata was the best of them all. He wouldn't lose.

He couldn't.

Yagura continued his ascent, watching as the pair of blonds continued heaving the unconscious man out of the water, only for two waves to coalesce right where they were, dispelling the clone. The now lone blond seemed to start to lose his grip on the man as he coughed out the water he'd inadvertently inhaled.

Once Yagura was completely out of the water, he moved. Using all his strength, even adding the slightest hints of chakra to his arms, Yagura ducked under the armored man's left arm and hoisted the man up where the blond could not.

"Are you alright?" Yagura's clipped tone seemed to shock the blond, who almost leapt away upon hearing the voice. Looking over, the blond took notice of Yagura, who gave the young teen a disarming half-smile and adjusted the armored man. "Don't worry, I'm not going to to harm you- I have no reason to."

The blond, wide-eyed, slowly nodded his head as they began to trek the tumultuous waters, which seemed to be calming down somewhat now that the ripples had stopped or gone their way.

"But I- we attacked you." The blond appeared completely out of his element. "Shouldn't you be, I dunno, killing the both of us right now?"

Yagura frowned. While he'd been forced to continue Kiri's nom de plume of the Bloody Mist, he actually never liked the graduation ceremony- it made so few shinobi, and a fair number of them died on their first high-ranked mission. Nor did he like how Kiri had no ties to any of the other Hidden Villages, as it would ultimately be their demise when the 4th Great Shinobi World War begins.

"Why would you think that, boy?" Yagura inquired, wondering where this fledgling ninja- for only ninja of at least Chunin rank, at least outside of Kiri, could effectively waterwalk- learned how the Shinobi world worked. The teen looked away, his long blond hair cascading down over his blue eyes.

Yagura's heart skipped a beat as he realized who this child might be related to.

"Just what I thought enemy ninja did if they weren't on opposing missions." the teen mumbled out, though Yagura could clearly hear what nearly came out as a jumbled mess of words. Yagura started, floored at what that man's child thought the Shinobi world was like.

"If Shinobi from two different allegiances met each other outside of combat, they would be wary of each other, but not to the point of outright attacking each other." Yagura paused, watching the blond as he listened to the former Kage. "But if they were to attack each other, it would be until their opponent was defeated or a mutual decision to stop is made, not to the death."

"Oh." the blond's answer is soft, and is almost drowned out by the surrounding sounds of the ocean. The two continued carrying their third companion in silence, though each had different reasons for doing so.

Yagura was trying to figure out why on earth the son of Konoha's Yellow Flash wasn't in his village, answering to his Kage, or learning from his Jonin-Sensei. Sneaking a glance at the object of his thoughts, he clearly saw that the boy was thinking over what he'd just been told. Eyes forward, Yagura let the silence stretch for as long as he could, though he'd never been one to not satisfy his curiosity.

"Are you the son of the Yondaime Hokage of Konohagakure?"

Yagura was known for many things, and subtlety was not one of them.

~~***~~

Naruto's entire body jerked in response, a full-body twitch at the blatant reminder.

Reminder that he was the son of a Kage.

That he'd never been told of that fact.

That he'd never gotten the treatment expected of family of a Kage- not that he'd really wanted it, seeing how Konohamaru had acted.

That the village that had rejected him had known of his lineage, yet saw fit to leave him to die, chakra sealed, in a remote forest at the edge of the Land of Fire.

In his peripheral vision, Naruto noticed the Mizukage suddenly realize the ramifications that his question had created, looking forward with an uneasy look upon his face.

"That's what everyone says." Naruto quietly answered, aware of the noise of the surf around them and pitching his voice accordingly. The Mizukage looked at Naruto in surprise. "And I'm hoping it isn't true."

"Why?" The Mizukage's voice cut sharp in the air, undertones of curiosity in it.

"Because then I'd have to deal with what he did to me." Naruto replied, a shard of ice making itself known in his chest. "With what he did to my mother."

The Mizukage seemed to come to what may have been the wrong conclusion, as the air became sharp, almost cutting as it entered Naruto's lungs.

"The man, when we met briefly at the end of the Third Shinobi World War, did not seem to type to rape anyone." Naruto looked up in alarm, shocked at the Mizukage's reasoning before the icy shard in his chest seemed to double in size at the man's words. The blond quashed down the thoughts that started to come unbidden to his mind, of the possibility of his mother being- _NO!_

He didn't even want to consider such a thing.

"That's... not exactly it." Naruto told the man. "My name's Uzumaki Naruto, and my mother-"

"You're an Uzumaki?" The Mizukage sounded surprised and impressed. "I suppose that you're mother was one too. Kaito-Sensei _did_ say that there had been others from the Uzumaki clan that got out before the fall of Uzushio. He even mentioned a distant cousin of his, whose name he couldn't remember, that had gone to live in Konoha. Kaito-Sensei's cousin was your mother, then."

"Distant cousin..." Naruto was awed, his mouth agape for several seconds before sea spray flew in, making him sputter to get it out. "The scroll didn't say that."

"Scroll?" The Mizukage tilted his head slightly to get a better look at the blond across from him, shifting his hold on the unconscious man. "Your mother didn't tell you herself?"

Naruto's face darkened, and he turned his head away, watching the surges of water against the darkening sky.

"I am the Jinchuuriki for the Kyuubi no Kitsune." Naruto coldly stated. "It was sealed into me by the Yondaime Hokage, costing him his life."

"That..." The Mizukage seemed to struggle to find the right words. "Perhaps he had his reasons."

"My mother was Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki before me, and died shortly after giving birth to me." Naruto tried to hold back the lump in his throat, but his voice cracked when he spoke again. "Cause of death was the unsealing of Kyuubi."

The air became biting, and Naruto staggered at the pain coming from him as he tried to breath the cutting substance.

~~***~~

Fu got up, gagging at the taste of water as it tried to go into her lungs. Around her was the wreckage of the ferryboat. Annoyances moaned in agony all around her, and she ignored them.

It's what she had learned to do.

Until she met that one group of not-annoyances, which confused her. All her life she'd only dealt with annoyances, client-annoyances and enemies. Not-annoyances were new to her.

Especially the blond-haired not-annoyance that she felt a physical attraction to.

Since joining their group, she learned that the not-annoyances were classified the same as her- Jinchuuriki. Curious, she'd reached out to them, finding kinship in the red-head- Gaara, and becoming good acquaintances with them.

"Fu!" Gaara- well, he doesn't really raise his voice- called over to her. She clambered out of the water, standing atop it like her friend. Leaning against the red-head was Roshi, who looked worse for wear, and laying atop a platform of black sand behind them were the injured annoyances. "Help get the injured out of the water."

"Why?" Fu questioned, and Gaara looked at her in what seemed to be surprise. "I mean, they will die soon enough. What is the purpose of making them comfortable in their final moments?"

"They are simply injured, those that are still alive we will take back to port for medical aid." Gaara answered, looking at the barely-conscious people surrounding them.

"I do not understand." Fu dead-panned.

"It is the right thing to do." Gaara replied, and continued upon seeing that Fu still did not understand. "It's what we, as people, must do."

Fu still maintained her dead-pan look. Gaara sighed.

"It's what Naruto would want us to do." Fu's face brightened up at the mention of the blond Jinchuuriki she found attractive, and went to work on the, in her opinion, confusing task of gathering the injured.

~~***~~

The air around Yagura was unconsciously turned into Wind Chakra, a habit that had formed when he'd begun to fully master his wind affinity. It was a part of what made people so creeped out by his pleasant smile when making death threats.

"To turn your child, the child of a Jinchuuriki, into a Jinchuuriki is reprehensable." Yagura stated, staring straight ahead, though his eyes were not focused on his surroundings. "It is immoral, and oft does not work."

"Why?" The blond's voice seemed to reach the man where others would not, and Yagura was snapped out of his trance, his head moving so fast his neck almost snapped from the sudden movement. As soon as he saw that the blond had struggled to just say that one word made Yagura stop emitting his (admittedly) unique Killer Intent. The blond started taking deep breaths, relishing in being able to breath normally again, making Yagura internally wince at having incited such a reaction in the young teen.

"It is so because of many things, though they all involve a single reason." Yagura answered, his voice- and the air- not as cutting as they were seconds before. "The child of a Jinchuuriki is just as powerful as a Jinchuuriki, even having some mark upon their bodies to label them as having a connection- a connection stronger than that of Jinchuuriki- with the Biju held in the parent they were borne from.

"Your whisker-markings on your face denote you as being the child of a Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi." Yagura continued, and the blond's face started to pale at what the man said.

"How..." The blond whispered, and Yagura presumed that the teen was wondering how this was known.

"The Shodai Hokage, as a gesture of good faith to the other nations, used his unique powers at controlling Biju to bestow them upon the Elemental Nations- one to Suna, one to Taki, and two each to Kumo, Iwa and Kiri. It is presumed that the last one was kept by Konoha. Kiri, upon receiving the Sanbi and Rokubi, immediately brought in the Uzumaki to seal them into Jinchuuriki. My own sensei, a distant cousin of your mother's it seems, said that he was there to witness the sealings. After the two Jinchuuriki were made, one of them fell in love and bore a child." Yagura took a breath to continue, building up the drama while still holding Naruto's attention. "The child was studied, and found to have all the powers of a Jinchuuriki, even able to draw upon the Yokai- demonic chakra," Yagura added upon seeing the look of confusion of Naruto's face. "of the Biju that her parent held, though this greatly stressed the parent, and soon after almost died from having their Biju removed from him. At that, the Shodai Mizukage chose to have the Biju removed from the father when the child was 8 years old, as the man had fallen into a coma due to the strain. The Rokubi, which was what the man had held, was removed and placed within the daughter.

"Their reasoning was that since she could already draw upon the Rokubi's Yokai, that she would be the best option as the Rokubi's Second Jinchuuriki." Yagura sighed. What came next he never liked to think about. "The sealing was a success, and the child grew stronger and older, even establishing a clan- the Kaguya. But it was near the end of the Second Great Shinobi World War, when she was forced to draw upon her Biju's chakra, that she suddenly went berzerk. Everyone on the battlefied she'd been at was slaughtered, and the Kaguya were moved out of Kiri for fear that they, as children and family of the girl, were also potentially prone to madness as she was. The girl, now a woman, had her Biju removed and she died because of it. Medical reports said that it was because of her connection to the Rokubi that she'd been influenced too much by the Yokai."

"What?" Naruto appeared to become ashen at the news, though Yagura wasn't done yet.

"Later, more recent studies say that it was because she'd manifested her first Chakra Tail that was because she'd gone berzerk, and the theory was that the children of Jinchuuriki, made Jinchuuriki themselves, were capable of completely losing it once they'd manifested the first Chakra Tail." Yagura started to conclude. "While regular Jinchuuriki do experience blood-lust their first time in tailed form, it is not as extreme as the madness from the Jinchuuriki child-turned-Jinchuuriki." Yagura looked sharply at Naruto, who was now somewhere between ashen and bone-white. "From your expression, you have yet to reach tailed form."

Naruto shook his head in the negative, and Yagura stopped walking making Naruto almost drop Han.

"It was the reason you aren't allied with your village anymore." Yagura said, looking Naruto in the eye. "Am I correct?"

"Yes." The quiet answer barely reached Yagura, who immediately looked away.

"I am... sorry to hear of that." Yagura stated. "And I am doubly so for what I am about to tell you."

Naruto's eyes widened to the point where they were in danger of popping out of the teen's head.

"When I was leaving the Gokage Summit at the end of the Third Shinobi World War, the Yondaime Hokage approached me and asked something of me."

"No..." Naruto's face was almost frenzied panic, though fear was the predominant emotion.

"He'd heard rumors of the Kaguya incident, and asked me," Yagura held back his emotions as best he could. "Asked me about the children of Jinchuuriki. He'd recently learned that his lover, whom I surmised was a Jinchuuriki, was pregnant."

"I hadn't- didn't..."Naruto was close to tears, and was exceptionally close to bawling.

"I know." Those simple words were all it took ,and Naruto broke.

The truth was never something anyone really wanted to know. Yagura had learned that the hard way.

~~***~~

As they approached the port, Roshi was on the edge of consciousness and was being held up by Fu, as the chakra exertion in maintaining the platform in such an environment was excessivly draining, even to a Jinchuuriki with high chakra reserves.

"What happened!" The crowd at the port were shocked at the display, and had sent several boats to search for survivors. The boats worked to shuttle the Jinchuuriki to port faster than if they'd had to expend their remaining chakra waterwalking. "How did you survive the Sanbi?"

"We were only lucky in that regard." Gaara said, taking hold of the situation with his soft but powerful voice. "However, these people require medical attention at once."

From the crowd, doctors appeared and started treating those with more minor injuries and taking the worse off of the black sand platform to be treated at the hospital. Gaara almost seemed to sigh in relief, the sand returning into his gourd, where it no longer drew upon his chakra. When the movement of the injured was over, Gaara lead the group, his platform holding only Utakata at that point, towards the nearest inn to rest and recover.

They would need all their energy if they were going to enlist the aid of this Utakata to locate Naruto and Han.

~~***~~

Naruto's sobs subsided over time, though the sky was quite dark and the moon was low in the sky when that time came. Sniffling, Naruto looked at the Mizukage.

"You know," He broke the lingering lump in his throat as all people do- with a small bit of chuckling. "I never got your name." Yagura gave Naruto a small smile, seeing that the teen was starting to pull himself together.

"Tadashii Yagura, former Yondaime Mizukage."

"Heh, truthful tower?" Naruto questioned, though it was a lighthearted joke. "What an weird name."

"Like you can joke, swirling maelstrom." Yagura sent back. "Or would you prefer I call you 'fishcake'?"

"Please not 'fishcake'." Naruto exasperatedly said, slumping. "I got enough of that before."

Yagura chuckled, his half-smile never widening, though. Suddenly Naruto stood straight, shifting Han.

"Wait, you said 'former Mizukage'." Naruto looked deathly serious. Yagura's half-smile disappeared in an instant, replaced with a look Naruto had seen once before- on the face of Zabuza when the swordsman had first appeared.

"I am no longer fit to be Mizukage, if I was so easily swayed by that vile creature." Yagura ground out, and the air slowly became sharp once more. "I swear upon my life, that you shall die, Uchiha."

"Uchiha Itachi?" Naruto asked, scared of what the answer would be, and Yagura jerked his head to the side, confused.

"No, why would you think that boy to be my tormentor?" Yagura was confused.

"Don't you know?" Naruto looked incredulous. "Itachi slaughtered every last one of the Uchiha, except his younger brother." Naruto looked away at that last part, not wanting to think of the promise he hadn't kept.

"While that does indeed make him formidible, he was not the one I am referring to." Yagura said, fixing Naruto with a hard stare.

"Then who?" Naruto was at a loss for who Yagura was referring to.

"Uchiha Madara." Yagura ground out.

Naruto would have questioned who that man was, but the two of them were distracted when there the sky lit up in the direction they were moving towards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yagura got that last name as an homage, of sorts, to the first time he appears in canon.


	13. Art

Utakata groaned, shoving his head deeper into his soft pillow to avoid waking- wait.

_Pillow?_

The last thing he remembered was fighting his fellow hunter-nin, several of whom he'd trained- too well, apparently, if they were able to best him.

But still. He hadn't expected soft, comfy pillow for defecting while traveling with the _Mizukage_ , of all people. At best, he'd expected soft stone floor after losing to his former colleagues.

"You are awake. Good." A soft, hard voice said from the far side of the room, making Utakata spin his upper body, allowing him to gain a foothold on the ground and pull him up in a defensive posture to face...

A red-headed teenager. Pale skin, as though the teen didn't get enough sun, was accentuated by the dark rings around his emerald eyes marking him as an insomniac- something Utakata could relate to, having been one himself. The teen was wearing something quite akin to Yagura wore, though his bright crimson muffler-scarf wrapped itself around the teen's abdomen, holding up a black gourd with white markings that reminded Utakata of the odd seals that Yagura had strewn all over his desk in the Mizukage's office.

"Who are you?" Slight disbelief tinged his voice, having been dubious that such a young Shinobi would be chosen for interrogation, though not completely in denial. After all, he hadn't been much older than the teen when he performed his first interrogation. And then it hit Utakata.

The teen wasn't wearing anything to show his affiliation. Whether that was a psychological ploy or not, Utakata didn't know, but the teen chose to answer the former hunter-nin.

"I am Kurosuna no Gaara, and my associates behind you can introduce themselves." Utakata's eyes widened in shock. _I hadn't sensed anyone else!_ Spinning around and backing away, he found himself face-to-face with a teenage girl a few years older than the boy holding up an older man, also a red-head like the teen. _Father and son, perhaps?_

"Fu. No clan name." The girl dismissively said, looking for all the world like she had better things to do than interact with Utakata.

"Roshi. Ditched my clan name with the family a few years back." The newly named Roshi grunted out, heavily leaning on Fu and favoring his right leg, making Utakata wonder if it was broken and this group needed him to heal it- Kiri hunter-nin were famed for being top medic-nin. It was a prerequisite to qualify as a hunter-nin, after all.

"I assume that none of you are affiliated with Kiri, then?" Utakata questioned, mentally going through each of his techniques he could use. While he didn't really need his pipe for his Jutsu, it really helped when aiming and directing his attacks. Utakata was on the verge of using one of his more obscure Jutsu to escape the rather plain room when the trio all answered in the negative. "Well, why do you need me, then?"

"Because when the Biju Ball exploded, the Sanbi was blasted away." Roshi answered, pausing to cough for a moment before continuing. "You're a hunter-nin. As such, you can lead us to it."

"Why the Hell would I lead you to that thing!" Utakata exploded, floored at what they wanted to do. He stood over the haunched-over man, who bade Fu step back for a minute.

And then the shorter, older man _loomed_ over Utakata, his presence almost making the older teen fall down on his knees. Roshi fixed the younger man with a hard glare, almost as though he were looking directly into Utakata's soul, judging all he saw.

Utakata was humbled by it.

"My brother and student were atop _that thing_ , as you put it." Roshi's gruff voice cut through the air like glass. Utakata was veritably blindsided by that revelation. While he was an only child, he'd had his fair share of students, having been a hunter-nin for half his life, serving under his grandfather, the late Sandaime, before going on the serve under the Yondaime Mizukage. It was the job of a veteran hunter-nin such as himself to teach the new recruits, taking on a single greenhorn hunter-nin to shadow him for a few months to learn the basics before going off by themselves. He still held himself responsible for Haku, who'd died on his watch when Zabuza had defected several years before. The androgynous teen had held- still held a soft spot in Utakata's heart, having been quite soft-hearted.

Even though he'd recently had to fight off several of those students, he'd been regretful at having had to do so.

"Fine." Utakata let out, his mouth moving of its' own accord. "I know how important a student is, so I'll help."

"Thank you." Now Roshi sounded all humbled, as though he hadn't just humbled the man across from him into submission.

"No prob." Utakata took it in stride, as expert hunter-nin were wont to do. "Now, do you want me to take a look at your wounds? We can't get this over with if any of you are injured."

Roshi nodded, and motioned for Fu to help him onto the bed that Utakata had exited minutes before. As Utakata started to treat the man- who had third-degree burns so bad that they were on the verge of being fourth-degree burns. Pumping as much healing chakra as he could, he even added some of the Rokubi's Yokai, which was quite similar to that of the chakra found in the Slug Summons that Tsunade of the Sannin was the holder of. Before his eyes, the charred and almost blackened skin and muscle peeled away like the skin of onions, the flayed and broken skin and muscle falling to the floor in a grotesque heap as they were replaced by the healthy muscles and skin. For a single moment, Roshi's hands were nothing but bone before they were covered by the new, healthy muscles, sinew, tendons, blood vessels, skin and fingernails.

Utakata looked slightly green at having bore witness to that, and as soon as the hands were done, he turned away to regain his composure and found that Fu and Gaara were staring intently at Roshi's hands before moving their gaze down to the bloody, burnt mess of what used to be the burned soft tissue that consisted of the man's hands.

Pulling out a scroll, Utakata prepared to seal away the waste and bury it deep in a forest before the pile was set upon by black particles emanating from Gaara. The black particles, which Utakata realized was either sand or metal dust, engulfed the waste before converging into a small pile where the waste had been. The sound made by the black stuff confirmed to Utakata that it was black sand, explaining where Gaara had gotten the name 'Kurosuna'. As the sand moved away, Utakata's stomach lurched a little as they revealed the perfectly clear floor, devoid of any indication that the bloody, burnt soft tissue had ever been there.

As a hunter-nin, he had bore witness to many disgusting things, but the blithe, almost absentmindedly mechanical way that Gaara had gotten rid of it suggested that the young teen was far more dangerous and mentally unstable than he appeared to be.

Fu's questioning of how Gaara had done that, and if she had the potential to do a similar thing disturbed Utakata in ways he never thought possible.

"So," Utakata said, his voice belying his thoughts on the matter, turned to Roshi, who was experimentally flexing his hands and gathering small amounts of chakra to them. "When do we leave to get your student?"

"Immediately."

~~***~~

The sky had almost darkened completely by the time they'd gotten to the dock, as Utakata had insisted he get a wardrobe change- which the group had agreed to.

Now, however, when Utakata had met up with them at the docks, they were wondering what he'd been thinking of when he'd chosen his wardrobe choice.

"Is this normal behavior for the people of Kiri?" Gaara asked Roshi, who was still gaping at the man in front of him.

"I... honestly don't know." Roshi breathed out, trying to conceive how the outfit would be conducive in a fight.

"Perhaps he is... what's the word for guys who dress like that?" Fu inquired, having been drawn into the conversation by Gaara and Roshi's expressions. At her words, Roshi suddenly nodded to himself, having agreed with Fu's inquiry.

"It is quite likely that you are correct." Gaara agreed, and the three nodded assent.

Utakata was not pleased.

"I am not a transvestite!" He shrieked at them, and they suddenly looked as though they'd just realized that he was right next to them.

"Is that what you thought we were talking about?" Roshi said, looking surprised that Utakata could hear their conversation. At the young man's tense nod, Roshi burst out laughing. "No, no. We agreed that you look quite androgynous in that outfit." Utakata calmed down, his entire body untensing.

"Androgynous?" Looking down Utakata surveyed his attire- an opal blue kimono with it's front open, revealing his chest to the world. Stuffed in it's inner folds were the various scrolls he'd had on him, and the long sleeves, which served to almost hide his hands, were quite useful when having to make one-handed seals on the fly without his opponent being any wiser. "I don't see what you're talking about."

"I don't expect you to." Roshi said, almost as if the older man was humoring the ex-hunter-nin. Utakata huffed and turned his head away from the trio standing in front of him. Absently, his senses indicated that something wasn't up, though for the life of him, he couldn't figure out what. He'd scanned the area for any odd chakra signatures, only coming up with the trio, who had rather large chakra reserves similar to his own and Yagura's. There was only one explanation for that, and Utakata, despite having cut off all allegiance to Kiri, didn't want to ultimately be implicated in the removal of Kirigakure by at least three Jinchuuriki.

"So tell me, before we start," Utakata began, turning away so they wouldn't see his expression. "Why are at least three Jinchuuriki heading into the Land of Water without proper authorization?"

The results of that statement were immediate. Utakata found himself wrapped in the confining and constricting black sand of Gaara, with Fu and Roshi taking offensive stances around it with Kunai in their hands.

"We were brought together by my student, the five of us." Roshi ground out, hoping that a battle would come of this situation. "All of us, Jinchuuriki."

"Why." Utakata gasped for air, his chest unable to properly expand in the hold. "Why get together?"

"Akatsuki." This time Gaara answered, turning the black sand so that Utakata could take full view of the teen. The word triggered something in Utakata's memory- Yagura assigning the Rokubi vessel to the Mizukage's personal guard so that he'd be perfectly safe from an organization that the Godaime Kazekage had warned the Elemental Nations of. He'd heard tell that it was the disappearance of two of the vessels- one of them Suna's own- that triggered the Kazekage spread word of the Akatsuki, though apparently it was too late of Iwa, which reported that both of it's Jinchuuriki had disappeared days before word of Akatsuki had reached it. They were still searching for the bodies of the two- brothers, if the intel held true.

Apparently the intel wasn't altogether correct, as the missing Jinchuuriki were all alive and well- and on the run, it seemed.

"I've heard of them." Utakata replied. "The Godaime Kazekage spread word of them throughout the Elemental Nations. Rumor was that the Godaime Hokage was furious at Jiraiya of the Sannin for letting their own disappear."

"That sounds like the gaki." Roshi said, and Utakata filed that statement away as potential info for a later time.

"Rumor also says that all of you were captured and had your Biju extracted." Here Roshi outright laughed.

"Well if they were then we're pretty lively dead people!" There was a minute adjustment as Utakata rolled his eyes, a small smirk appearing at the joke. "Besides, why would we attack Kiri?"

The counter-question threw Utakata for a loop.

 _Why, indeed..._ They had no real allegiance to anyone, meaning that there were no political factors involved in justifying an attack on any of the Hidden Villages. None of them fought against Kiri in the Third Great Shinobi World War, nor were they from anywhere that would have fought Kiri, so that took out any personal factors any of them might have. None of them seemed the type to do things on a whim, which left Utakata stumped as to the reason for them to attack Kiri.

"I...don't know, really." He reluctantly admitted. "I just assumed that, since you were all Jinchuuriki, your group was going to infiltrate and destroy Kiri. The reason to do so didn't really cross my mind until you said it."

"Humph." Roshi nodded in accordance with what Utakata had shared, his look suggesting that he'd taken what Utakata had shared about Iwa's reaction and was wondering what they'd do if- no, _when_ they realized that their two Jinchuuriki had practically deserted. "Anything else you wanna ask, while you're at it?"

"Actually, yes." Utakata replied. Even if he may never cross paths with them again, he wasn't going to let their outgoing nature stop him from getting any information out of them. "Who's your leader?"

The trio shared a look, and it was clear that the 'leader' role wasn't clearly defined.

"I guess I am." Roshi answered. "At least, these kids look to me for guidance. Since I'm the oldest, it might as well be me who leads this rag-tag group of misfits."

"So you're the one who brought everyone together?" Utakata was impressed at how organized they seemed, despite there not really being any single one in charge. To add insult to injury, Roshi shook his head in the negative.

"Nah, the gaki was the one who brought us together." Roshi stated. "Found him and Gaara gambling in Tenshi-Gai- and raking in quite the haul, I might add."

"Naruto is quite skilled at gambling, though he does not appear to like having to resort to it." Gaara added.

"Anyway," Roshi drawled, "After saving my brother from Akatsuki and seeking refuge in Takigakure, he brought up a damn good point- we can't be there to save each other all the time. Had me and Han gone back to Iwa, one, if not both, of us would have been taken down by Akatsuki. He said that we had to stay together, fight as a group- and also made a comment on tag-teaming a single person not being fair. I really gotta teach that kid what the Shinobi world is really about."

"So a teenage boy brought all of you together." Utakata wouldn't have believed it if the proof wasn't in front of him. The group nodded in their own unique way. "So he's the leader then."

"I guess you could say that." Roshi mused, and Gaara seemed contemplative at that himself.

"Why did you follow him, then?" Utakata was confused beyond belief at what they were saying.

"He has this sort of charming presence. It's hard to describe, really. You have to just see it for yourself." Roshi said, moving towards the docks before calling back. "And a word of warning: He'll want you to join us."

"Well, he'll be hard-pressed to do that." Utakata replied, moving to join the group as the last vestiges of sunlight disappeared in the horizon, giving way to the dark of the night.

As he jogged to join with the group, his Shinobi-sense, something honed after years in the hunter-nin, went haywire. The only thing amiss was a seagull dive-bombing them-

"Scatter!" He screamed, and the group dived for cover in time to avoid the seagull's impact, which was a large fireball that engulfed the surrounding area.

"Well damn." Someone said from above. The voice was very loud, as though the person speaking had to yell so much that he was used to it. "I'd hoped to kill that bastard's son-in-law, hmm."

~~***~~

Deidara had, at first, resisted upon hearing that he was to bring in the Rokubi. He knew that the sons-in-law of the Sandaime Hokage were both Jinchuuriki, and had been pissed when the honor of taking them in were bestowed to Kakuzu and Kisame.

What. The. Hell?

He was from Iwa! He knew what they looked like, where they could be found, and yet Leader gave the privilege to those two?

If he wasn't so Hell-bound on killing Itachi, he might have quit Akatsuki- even if he had to self-explode to do so.

And so, he dejectedly went to bring in the Rokubi alone- because all his heckling of Sasori losing to the weakest of the Jinchuuriki had made the puppeteer try to murder the Iwa missing-nin, resulting in the duo breaking apart to work alone. _And Leader sided with him!_

What. The. Hell.

Granted, Deidara was given all the needed info on the Rokubi Jinchuuriki by an aggravating contact of _Zetsu's_ \- a childish, possibly insane masked man by the name of Tobi. The two first met in an odd situation- Deidara had been flying over the area looking for his contact when the man had appeared in front of him.

The fact that he'd been several hundred feet above the ground appeared to have little meaning to the crazed man-child as he'd plummeted to what should have been his doom. Tobi had even held a conversation, of all things, with Deidara while the guy was falling. It had only been Deidara's fast acting that saved the guy from dying on the ground below.

Granted, Tobi simply joyously leaped off the clay bird once he'd given the info, cheering for gravity as he fell. Deidara shrugged and let the guy fall. It wasn't _his_ problem if the guy died- all he would say in his defense was that Tobi had been chanting 'go gravity go' the entire way down.

So, after heading off from the Northern edge of the Land of Wind, Deidara made quick work of the massive distance to the Eastern shore of the Land of Hot Water- Hidan's place of origin, apparently, as a quick stopover in Yugakure proved. It was dusk on the second day when he'd finally made it to the port that the Mizukage and his guard were going to pass by on their way to the Northeastern edge of the Land of Water- and the port town was in an uproar.

Circling low had provided the news that the Sanbi had appeared- attempting to obliterate a ferry-boat into the Land of Water that the Rokubi vessel took refuge in when he'd defected. Rumors abounded that the Yondaime Mizukage had died due to overdrawing on the Sanbi's Yokai, setting the beast loose.

Deidara's eye twitched hard.

What. The. Hell?

Now he had to bring bad news to Leader in addition to bringing in the Rokubi. Figures that something like that would happen- he'd never believed in luck or the karma shit some of those monks were spouting, even though his life was a case study in luck and karma.

Taking to the sky once more, Deidara kept a close eye on the ground, searching for his target. If the vessel had gone missing-nin, then he'd have to stay in town until the spotlight turned away from it. Scanning the port in the disappearing light, Deidara was on the verge of giving up when he'd spotted his target, which was deep in conversation with-

Oh. Hell. Yes.

The son-in-law of the Sandaime Tsuchikage and grandson of the Nidaime Tsuchikage.

Life could not get better than this.

Deidara lowered his right hand into the pouch on his hip, allowing the mouth in the palm of his hand to consume enough clay for a good-sized explosion. Pulling his hand out, his hand shifted as the mouth charged the clay into a deadly explosive while expertly shaping it into the creature he wanted it as. The mouth opened, revealing a tiny seagull, white as snow. With a quick hand seal and a puff of smoke, the seagull was now the size of a normal seagull, which took flight towards the space between that Roshi-bastard and the vessel.

As it neared the deck, he made the correct hand seal and set it off.

_Katsu!_

The resulting explosion devastated the dock, but neither were injured.

"Well damn." Deidara said as the giant seagull he rode upon dropped down to a few yards above the dock. "I'd hoped to kill that bastard's son-in-law hmm."

~~***~~

Roshi swore. Violently.

Deidara, he remembered, was borderline insane. He'd coveted the role of Tsuchikage, even vying for the tutelage of the Sandaime himself- but was turned down repeatedly. The then-teen had been dejected, seeking solace in his innate ability to expertly sculpt almost anything- until he'd heard that the Sandaime was favoring Roshi to be the Yondaime Tsuchikage. At that point, the blond had snapped, killing everyone he could and stealing a rare Kinjutsu allowing him to infuse chakra into anything he came in contact with before going missing-nin.

The ironic thing was, if Deidara hadn't gone bat-shit, he might've been a lock for Yondaime. After all, Roshi had neither want nor need of the title- and it was part of the reason he'd started wandering the Land of Earth.

 _But apparently Deidara's still as bat-shit as before- though he is a bit of a genius, if he's using the Kinjutsu to make these things._ Roshi thought as he dodged the many tiny bombs the crazed Akatsuki member was launching at him. The Kinjutsu, having had no formal name, seemed to change the user's body accordingly, never doing the same thing twice.

"Why won't you die!" Deidara screamed, jumping off of his giant clay seagull, which careened towards the man, who waited until the last second to jump high in the air, boosted up slightly by the force of the explosion. Landing on the water, Roshi was thankful that he'd been able to move the fight away from the docks, where Fu and Gaara lie in wait- neither of them able to sustain a fight on the water with their Nin-taijutsu and Sand, respectively. Utakata, on the other hand, had been forced into the fight for a slightly different reason: he was Deidara's assigned target.

Deidara avoided hitting the water by holding out the palm of his hand, the mouth within spitting out a shaped glob of clay- which turned into a large turtle that Deidara landed upon. Shoving both hands into the pouches on his hips, Deidara smirked at Roshi before pulling out his hands and cupping them. Immediately, a bunch of oval-shaped clay figures appeared in his hands, which Deidara tossed into the water. Roshi stood on edge, scanning the water for any sign of the aquatic bombs that had most likely dispersed into the surrounding area.

 _Where the hell is the ass?_ Utakata had disappeared some time ago, allowing Deidara to focus on Roshi only. Roshi prepared to move at the slightest hint of trouble when the clay turtle Deidara stood upon was rent to pieces by a million tiny high-pressure jets of water from below. As the jets dissipated, Utakata rose from the depths, his ascent stopping when the soles of his sandals reached the surface of the water.

Roshi was not amused or impressed.

"What the hell were you waiting for?" Roshi growled out, furious. Utakata simply waved his hand into the distance.

"Had to get rid of those pesky clay fish first." Utakata answered, sounding exceedingly bored.

"And before that?" Utakata smirked.

"The jet doesn't work after about 10 feet above the water." He replied. "Had to wait until he was close to or on the surface to attack."

"You'd think hunter-nin weren't expected to take out their target from a distance." Roshi was _pissed_. He'd had to endure the last several minutes of Deidara's wrath- wait.

Deidara.

"Where-"

BOOM!

The water below them exploded in a cascade upwards, sending the two flying away from each other. Roshi had to act as fast as he could to avoid falling into the water, while Utakata made the act look effortless.

"It appears my bluff worked, hmm." The smug voice of Deidara taunted from high above, revealing that he was completely unharmed by the water jets. Flying low, he looked at the town in the near distance while looking between the two. "It's been fun playing with you two, but I've got things to do." Pointing his right hand at Utakata, the former Kiri hunter-nin found himself subject to a volley of tiny rock-like objects, breaking more than a few ribs. The hunter-nin collapsed, sinking slightly in the water before he was scooped into the mouth of the clay pelican Deidara was riding. Hoisting up a small doll-like object, Deidara looked at Roshi. "Let's see you survive my C3 bomb."

Deidara rose high in the air, preparing to send his C3 down atop Roshi, his ascent was stopped when the head of the clay pelican exploded, having been eroded by acid from within.

"You didn't do your homework." Utakata's voice cut through the air, and the Rokubi vessel looked at Deidara with murder in his eyes. "My Biju is a slug, known for their healing properties and acid."

Raising his pipe, Utakata, clad in the green-ish cloak of his Biju's Yokai, sent a volley of acid at Deidara, who retaliated by tossing his C3 doll at the attack before turning into a clay clone.

The acid spray hit the ceramic doll, causing it to crack.

The sky lit up for several seconds from the resulting explosion, and Roshi was sent down into the water by the force of the shockwave, saving him from the inferno.

~~***~~

Naruto and Yagura started running in the direction of the light- if anything could create that kind of thing, it had to be a high-ranked ninja. Most likely one from Kiri, who would aid them because Yagura held the mantle of Yondaime Mizukage.

Their cargo meant that they had to endure the fast speed in bursts, stopping every other minute to ensure that Han wasn't left adrift in the sea.

"What do you think it was?" Naruto asked Yagura, who barely took notice of the question.

"I don't know." He answered, which was true. He hadn't yet seen a jutsu that could light up the night sky, but held the firm belief that whoever it was would aid them, simply for the fact that he was the Mizukage- former Mizukage, but his retirement was on-the-spot, so none could really dispute his claim.

It was nearly a half-hour afterwards, when the both of them were getting slightly winded (something Yagura noted about the young Uzumaki for future reference) that the lights of the port that Naruto had come from several hours- was it really hours? It felt like days since the sun had risen in the sky.

They continued running, passing through a massive heat bubble as they neared shore.

"That is most likely remnants of the jutsu we saw." Yagura answered Naruto's unspoken question as they slowed down.

"Right." Naruto sounded distracted, and soon after voiced his opinion. "So, what are you gonna do when we reach the port?"

"I... do not know." Yagura answered. "I feel I cannot return to Kiri as its Kage, nor can I return in any other way, as my actions while under Madara's control has made me quite unpopular with the residents of Kiri. The only thing I can feasibly do is disappear in my special training ground in the northern edge of the Land of Water."

"Oh?" Naruto was intrigued at the thought of what a Kage's training ground would be like- especially one befitting of a Jinchuuriki Kage.

"Yes. In fact," Yagura started. "I'd love to offer you the chance to come with me."

"What?" Naruto was freaking out. He'd just been offered the chance to go train with a _Kage!_

"I'm not kidding, if that's what you're thinking." Yagura added as they stepped onto the dock. "I'd really like to study your seal- I study them in my free time." He almost sheepishly added. "And there haven't been any ways for people to study Children of Jinchuuriki- you are the first I've heard of that didn't go insane after reaching the first tail."

"But I thought that the Kaguya girl was the only one?" Naruto questioned as he and Yagura moved towards the nearest inn, though it seemed as though Yagura was almost leading them there. Yagura shook his head.

"No, there were others. Her own children, for instance. Though they didn't draw upon the Rokubi's Yokai, they were prone to bouts of insanity. The entire clan grew to become war-mongers, and they attacked Kiri about a year before I took office. The losses made the Sandaime realize that he could no longer hold the title of Mizukage." Yagura explained. "And the first Sanbi Jinchuuriki went on to create the Yuki clan, which became known as cursed due to the power behind their Ice Release-"

"Ice Release?" Naruto dreaded the answer. "Like, they could create ice mirrors and move through them?"

"Yes. How do you know that?" Yagura was shocked at the question. He'd known that the entire Yuki clan had died off in the early days of the Bloodline Hunts. Naruto turned away, unsure if he should continue.

"I met a kid about my age who could do those things." Naruto mumbled out. "He traveled with this one guy- Zabuza-"

"Momochi Zabuza of the Seven Swordmen?" Yagura flared up. "Where did you see them? What were they doing?"

"They died." Naruto answered, his eyes covered by his shaggy hair. "My Jonin-Sensei killed... the kid, and Zabuza died of his injuries." He wasn't sure of he should use Haku's name, if he was a part of a clan that was labeled as cursed.

"Mm." Yagura grunted, his face nondescript. "A shame. Zabuza was one of the greater ones to have wielded the Kubikiribocho. I'd have liked to have found him, perhaps even gotten him to join me."

Naruto was silent as they went into the inn. Hoisting Han up against himself, Naruto bade Yagura to get them a room, even pulling a few ryo- somehow having survived the splashdown dry- out of his pocket.

"I'd like a room for me, my nephew and our friend. He's had a bit too much sake, you see." Yagura acted all sheepish, rubbing the back of his head similar to Naruto's habitual act.

"I'm afraid the only free room we've got is adjoining an occupied room." the clerk, a average-sized mousy girl said. "That explosion earlier took out a few of the seaside houses, so we're full up with locals in need of a place to stay."

"That's alright, we'll take it." Yagura waved her off, exchanging the ryo for the room key, which led them to the second floor- and one room 216.

"So will you be staying the night or heading off?" Naruto questioned, receiving an odd look from Yagura.

"It's the dead of night, boy, and I certainly don't intend to travel when I'm not at my best." Yagura tersely stated, sticking the key in the lock and opening the door.

"Right." Naruto distractedly replied, listening to the people renting out the- wait, was that Gaara's voice? "..the Hell?"

"What is it, Naruto?" Yagura continued to move, setting Han down on the bed while Naruto stood transfixed on the door to the adjoining apartment. Suddenly, Naruto was at the door, grabbing the handle and wrenching it open to find...

a face-full of lanky man- Utakata, if Naruto remembered correctly.

"What the hell?" Utakata said, getting up off of Naruto and glaring down at the teen, seeming to have not noticed the other occupants of the room. "Don't you know to knock before-"

"Hello." Yagura's voice stopped Utakata cold. The man had drastically paled, though he didn't look towards the source of the voice. "What was that you were saying about knocking before entering?"


	14. Coalesce

Naruto looked up at the pallid man standing over him, who'd frozen upon hearing Yagura's voice. His fist still lay several inches above Naruto's face, which and started to rise up off of the floor. Sliding, Naruto felt the backs of his shirt and jacket remain where they were, causing him minor discomfort as he moved to the side, away from under the tall kimono-clad man. Getting up, Naruto was almost sent to the ground again as Roshi rushed into the room and to his brother's side.

"He's fine- knocked out, but fine." Naruto answered as Roshi turned and opened his mouth. Closing it, he turned back and opted to simply stay by his brother's side, noting Yagura's presence in the way he sat facing the former Mizukage. "Yagura's good too." Naruto waved his hand towards the object of the conversation.

"Well, Utakata?" Yagura clipped out, and Utakata paled a little more at hearing his name. "Why do we knock before entering?"

"Because," Utakata said, his voice sounding dry and cracked, and the man visibly swallowed before continuing. "The people in the other room might be conducting important business."

"And~?" Yagura drew out the single word, and Utakata shivered slightly in response before reluctantly answering.

"It's good manners." The embarrassed tone made Naruto giggle slightly before Yagura turned his unrelenting gaze upon the boy.

"The same goes for you, Naruto." Yagura intoned, and Naruto felt a chill creep slowly down his spine at hearing the tone directed at him. "It is improper to enter a room without knocking. The only exception is when on a mission. Then, and only then, are you able to ignore etiquette."

"Yes, sir." Naruto felt his mouth respond, and could only nod his head in agreement.

"Good. As you were." Yagura said before turning and moving to introduce himself to Gaara and Fu, who were still in the other room. Stopping next to Utakata, who had yet to move a muscle, he added. "Don't worry. I don't blame you for your actions. Were I in your position, I'd have done the same."

With that said, he went and, at Gaara's word that they were free to come as they please, went and formally introduced himself to the duo, who did likewise before heading towards Naruto.

"It is good to see you're alive and unharmed." Gaara said, stopping before Naruto, who looked away and waved it off.

"Nah, nothing's gonna hurt me. After all, I'm-" He stopped, the next words lodging themselves inside his throat. This was the part he'd usually say that he was gonna be the next Hokage. But, after hearing Yagura tell him about Children of Jinchuuriki, combined with the fact that everyone seemed to immediately know who his father was by taking one look at him, had him thinking.

He'd been lied to about his parents all his life, and was all the different for it, by the village he'd once sworn to die for. The same village that wouldn't do the same for him, he was slowly realizing.

He didn't know what to think about his father, except that what he'd heard and known meant that the man he'd always looked up to had purposely turned him into a Jinchuuriki, robbing him of the chance at a normal life- or at least, as normal as he would get as the offspring of a Jinchuuriki. Naruto had always prided himself on how optimistic he was, yet there was nothing known about the situation that he could find or put a positive spin on.

His father had known, when Yagura had given the information needed, that Naruto was going to be prone to madness, so did that mean that there was something contained within the seal to lessen the chance of it happening (as there was already no way that there was something done to it to stop the madness completely, given how he'd been after his fight with Sasuke).

But that could be dealt with later- Yagura had been under the tutelage of an Uzumaki seals master, and would be able to check it out later on.

Which just left the topic at hand: He'd been made a weapon to serve Konoha by his father, so why should he strive to become Hokage?

Naruto couldn't answer that question like he would have done months ago.

Suddenly he was snapped out of his reverie by Fu tugging on his arm, wondering if he was injured.

"I'm fine." His abrupt answer shocked the girl into falling back, though she'd twisted so it was a handspring back onto her feet. "I was gonna say that I'm fine. So, Gaara, how'd you guys do?"

Fu huffed and wandered over to Utakata, staring at his still form for several seconds in contemplation before shoving him down, which he was able to counter with a sweeping of the legs that Fu hopped over before going to impress Yagura, who was in the other room watching them interact. Utakata's eyes followed her for a few seconds before he turned and looked at Naruto, clearly unimpressed.

"The hunter-nin were quickly dealt with, and the worst of it was the Sanbi." Gaara glanced over at Yagura with what appeared to be jealousy before returning to the conversation. "The ferry was destroyed in the blast. We collected the injured onto a platform of my sand before heading towards port and... _persuading_ Utakata into helping us locate you." Gaara looked like he was keeping something back, but Naruto figured that if Gaara had anything else to tell, he would in time. Naruto mutely nodded, indicating that the conversation was at an end before turning to glance at Roshi, who was still at Han's side, resolutely keeping vigil for his brother's quick recovery.

Naruto felt for the guy, even if he didn't know what it felt like to have to worry about his own flesh-and-blood brother- the pain of watching Sasuke 'die' during the mission to Wave gave him an idea of how much it hurt to almost lose a loved one- moreso considering he'd personally known who his opponent was. Naruto imagined that Roshi would want to return to Iwa once Han was good enough for travel, and he wouldn't blame the guy.

He would do the same, given the chance.

"You aren't what I was expecting." the unexpected voice made Naruto spin around in shock, nearly sending him down on the floor once more.

"Wha...?" Naruto was slightly dazed by the sudden motion combined with the alteration in balance- something he should have been better trained against. Utakata simply stood there impassively, gazing at Naruto and silently judging the teen.

"I said, you aren't what I was expecting." Utakata repeated, his stare almost glacial. "From what your friends were saying, I was expecting the perfect example of a leader, not- this." He gestured towards Naruto, who was wearing his now-rumpled orange jacket over a torn black tee and forest green pants, sighed, his shoulders slumping down. The teen's hair was also matted down from the water, making for an odd sight as it covered his eyes entirely, given its natural spikiness. He'd had a long day, and didn't want to deal with smarmy people mocking him.

"This coming from the guy who planned on taking on the Mizukage and winning." He retorted. "Go apologize to Yagura and find a comfy spot on the floor to sleep. We discuss this stuff in the morning."

"Hey, you aren't-" Utakata began telling Naruto off before he was sent to his knees when acutely directed Killer Intent was sent his way.

"I said," Naruto turned towards Utakata, whose blood froze when he saw the glare the boy was sending his way. "We'll discuss this stuff in the morning."

Everyone had stopped what they were doing when they felt the barest hints of Killer Intent, and watched on as Utakata mutely nodded before Naruto nodded his head assent, turned and continued on his way, slumping down on the corner of one of the futons. The Killer Intent disappeared shortly before soft snoring could be heard coming from the blond.

"Whoa." Fu's statement mirrored the thoughts of everyone in the room. Utakata slumped down on the floor, staying in a heap before crawling to pull out the extra futons in the nearby closet. Setting one up, he got into it before the soft, deep breathing of sleep could be heard from him also. Everyone set up futons before going to sleep themselves.

It had been a long day, and tomorrow was bound to be a handful, regardless of what happened.

~~***~~

Lying on his futon, Yagura could hear the soft breathing of the sleeping forms all around him, but he barely took note of that. His mind had already had one thing on his mind- Uzumaki Naruto. The sudden and abrupt focusing of Killer Intent to that level was almost unheard of, being only the stuff of tales about past Kage or skilled Shinobi before the time of Hidden Villages. Killer Intent was too wild a substance for any but _the_ most skilled of Shinobi to use to great effect.

Which made Naruto's actions quite impressive- albeit scary. The teen hadn't seemed like the type to have ever really used Killer Intent, and yet it wasn't altogether strange- those less prone to using Killer Intent were better at focusing it on a single individual than those who could and would use it regularly. Yagura would be lying if he said that he wasn't intrigued by what the boy had done- after all, it took an inconceivable amount of skill to bring together Jinchuuriki of different allegiances.

_Though they appear to no longer have **any** allegiance, towards anyone... But Naruto._

It wouldn't surprise Yagura in the least if Utakata chose to go with Naruto's group- either to ensure he wouldn't have to face the blond teen in battle or because of the strange charisma that made anyone he met want to join his side.

Of course, given Utakata's rebellious nature, Yagura bet that it would be the latter option.

 _Perhaps..._ Yagura thought, a plan forming in his mind. _Yes, that would work quite nicely..._

 

~~***~~

The morning approached quickly, and none of them were too happy about it- with the exception of one.

"What the..." Han was confused. The last thing he remembered was prepping a Biju Ball- a small one, though that didn't make it any less destructive- to use against the Mizukage, who'd seemed to have unleashed his Biju at the cost of his life to defeat his opponents. The Sanbi had been prepping its' own Biju Ball when there'd been a pulse in the air, making Han's own Biju Ball explode early- and ineffectively. After that- nothing.

"You're awake!" The wizened voice of his older brother drew his eyes away from the drab ceiling and towards his left, where Roshi was getting up off of a separate futon to check on Han. Internally rolling his eyes at how like a mother-hen his brother could be sometimes, Han waved off his brother's attempts to ensure that there were no injuries on the armor-clad man, who simply sat up and tried to take note of everything around him.

"I'm fine." Han stopped Roshi's babbling about his worries and simply looked the other man in the eyes while the other occupants in the room began to stir. "What happened while I was out?"

"Oh, you're awake!" Naruto's voice came from the far end of the room, and he was standing in the doorway connecting to what appeared to be a room identical to the one Han was in. All around them, eveyone started their own morning rituals: Gaara was pulling out of the meditative state to engage in conversation with Fu, who was performing her usual morning stretches- something she called Yoga and used to almost shamelessly flirt with Naruto; Off to the side, two other people- one of whom Han clearly recognized- were going through their own morning rituals, checking and performing basic maintenance on their equipment. Upon following Han's gaze, Naruto was quick to answer. "These guys are Utakata and Yagura- they're good."

Han simply nodded, dazed at seeing the Mizukage- who'd looked up upon hearing his name- stand and approach him.

"I apologize for my previous actions." Yagura bowed, and Han was starting to feel a sense that he was still dreaming. "I was not in the right state of mind, which cause me to make decisions I normally wouldn't. I hope you can see it in you to forgive me."

"I..." Han was at a loss for words, and his dazed voice showed it, making Yagura stand back up as Naruto approached them, studiously ignoring the suggestive movements of the teal-haired girl as he did.

"It's alright." Naruto answered for him. "I think you're forgiven Yagura."

"Perhaps." Yagura's clipped tones left nothing to the imagination as he went back to finish tending to his hook-staff.

"What..." Han wasn't normally a man that could easily be stupefied, but what he'd just seen _could not_ be real. Naruto just laughed and waved his hand in the air, grinning all the while.

"Just accept it, Han. After all, the two of us would still be out at sea if it weren't for him coming to help." Naruto seemed to vibrate as he continued. "Besides, he's offered to let me go and train with him!"

Han frowned. It was rare of a Kage to simply offer to train a shinobi hailing from a different Hidden Village without reason. He was about to say something when it was _Fu_ , of all people, who voiced the thoughts of everyone in the room.

"What about us?"

...Okay, not _every_ one's thoughts. But close enough.

"You are free to come with me." Yagura chimed in, having finished ensuring that his hook-staff was in top shape before sealing it away in a scroll that was soon hidden away within the folds of his muffler. "I'm rather curious how much control each of you has over your Biju. And if you, Naruto, allow me," Here, it was the blond's turn to frown. "I'd like to get a look at your seal. Perhaps I can help you with your problem."

 _That_ got the interest of everyone in the room, and Han could see that even Utakata, who'd tried not to get involved, was watching the conversation.

"There's a problem, gaki?" Roshi questioned, and Naruto looked a little uncomfortable before relenting.

"You already know who my parents are." Naruto said, confirming Han's suspicions on who the teen's parentage, though Utakata and Fu looked almost lost in what he was talking about before Gaara summed it up so everyone was on the same page.

"The Yondaime Hokage and previous Jinchuuriki of Kyuubi." Gaara stated, looking unnaturally interested, something Han thought was an admirable quality in the young red-head. Knowledge was power, and half the battle was won with it. "Otherwise known as Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina."

"Well, it turns out that how I acted after achieving the one tailed form for the first time-"

"Not possible." Utakata cut in. "You can't be like this if you've done that already. None of the others showed any sign of recovery."

"Others?" Here, Yagura decided to answer the question.

"When a Jinchuuriki has a child, the offspring has a special connection with the Biju contained within their parent, allowing them to draw upon the Yokai as though they were the Jinchuuriki, though it puts a great strain on the parent, who has to deal with what basically amounts to their Biju practically breaking out of the seal. It's unknown just how deep that connection runs, though. None of the children, after drawing on enough of the Yokai for the one tailed form, were capable of talking to others." Yagura paused to take a breath before continuing. "They went insane, killing any and everything they set their eyes on. In the end, the Biju had to be removed and placed into a new container."

"That does not make sense." Gaara interjected. "The scroll Naruto was given said that the wife of the Shodai Hokage was a Jinchuuriki herself, and yet she went on to have children and grandchildren- one of whom is now the Godaime Hokage."

"I don't know what to say about that." Yagura answered, turning back towards the room. "We can only assume that it was the Shodai Hokage's presence during those pregnancies that kept those Children from gaining the connection with Kyuubi. He _was_ capable of controlling the Biju with his Wood Release, so his chakra may have had the same effect with his family, due to family having similar chakra signatures.

"Getting back on point, The Children, as they came to be known as, went on to found some of the prominent Kekkei Genkai-wielding clans in the Land of Water. Those that did not succumb to madness in those clans were few and far between, however, and were often killed by their own family." Turning to Utakata, he continued. "It was for this reason that the Sandaime, your grandfather, ordered the destruction of everyone with a Kekkei Genkai born from the Child of a Jinchuuriki. The deaths of the lesser clans were only because I was being controlled at the time."

"Yeah, who was that guy you were talking about?" Naruto added his two cents to the conversation. "Uchiha something. Mandara?"

"Uchiha Madara?" Roshi gaped, and Han was in agreement. The stories they'd been told of Madara and his legendary illusions were downright nightmarish. There were legends that Madara was able to control entire armies like they were his puppets, making them gleefully kill each other as though they were slaughtering the opposing Shinobi. The fact that he'd been killed was something that all Iwa-nin _still_ celebrated to this day. To hear that he was still alive- nothing short of every single Hidden Village working together would be enough to ensure Madara would remain dead.

"Who's he?" Fu chimed in, looking confused at the turn in the conversation. Before Yagura could answer, Roshi started speaking.

"Uchiha Madara is the one of the strongest Shinobi to have ever existed- and the second person to have been able to control the Biju, something no Jinchuuriki has ever been able to do." Roshi stopped talking, taking a moment to regain his composure, which allowed Yagura to take control of the conversation once more.

"That isn't exactly true." The entire room turned to look at the former Kage. "I've found a way for a Jinchuuriki to have complete control over their Biju."

"How?" Gaara's voice was sharp, though the plea was very clear to all. "How do you know it will work?"

"Because I tried it myself." Yagura answered.

"Then you need to teach us." The voice was altogether unexpected, and everyone looked at Naruto in shock. "If Madara's alive, and able to control the Biju- Hell, if he's able to control us, then why're we just standing around doing nothing. If there's a way for us to use our Biju to the fullest, we're gonna need it."

"We?" Utakata snorted. "I'm not going with you, so count me out."

"Would you have lived had I not been there to divert Deidara's attention last night?" Roshi stated, gaining the attention of Naruto and Han, who were equally confused. Deidara was a missing-nin, what would he want with a fresh Kiri missing-nin?

"Who's Deidara?" Naruto questioned.

"Deidara's an insane Iwa missing-nin. He stole a rare Kinjutsu before going off." Roshi answered. "It gave him these mouths on his palms that he can use to create explosive clay."

"That doesn't sound so bad." Naruto's face twisted into one where he didn't get the point.

"Given that one of his stronger clay creations lit up the sky for what must have been miles around, he's dangerous." Roshi responded, and Naruto's face seemed to light up with understanding.

"So _that's_ what that light was!" He seemed to mutter to himself, and Yagura too had the same look upon his visage.

"Anyway, he can make those creations become any size he needs them to be." Roshi continued. "The explosions were massive. So tell me, Utakata, would you have lived had you had no one there to distract Deidara?"

Utakata, for his part, let out a huff and silently nodded.

"Then come with us." Roshi finished. Utakata looked like he wasn't sure what he would go with.

"You got any better ideas?" Naruto asked of the man, who shook his head, a sly smirk on his face as he reached out to seal the deal with the blond teen.

" _Now_ you're the guy I was expecting."

~~***~~

Packing up had been hectic for the group, as they'd had to stop several fights on bathroom usage- and one case of "attempted to molest" involving Naruto and Fu. In the end, though, all of them were packed and ready to go- except Yagura, who had needed a change in attire along with something else. When he emerged from the other room, the group was in awe at how much he'd changed with simply by changing the clothes he wore.

The muffler was replaced with one of an obsidian color, and Yagura now wore a loose long-sleeve shirt in an earthen brown similar to Naruto's clothes. He no longer wore the grey pants, instead opting for a dark red, so dark it was almost black in color. The only thing of his old outfit that he'd kept were his sandals, which fit with the rest of his attire perfectly.

And then there was his face.

About halfway through changing, he'd called Utakata into the room with him to do something- which had everyone guessing as to what it was, though the only thing they'd agreed on was that it involved something Yagura couldn't put on himself, like Gaara and his gourd. But now, when they could clearly see what it was, they were shocked.

Where once there was a scar running from his right eye to his chin, there remained nothing. Smooth skin greeted them where only moments before it was an unhealing scar, complete with marks to suggest the method used to keep the wound closed.

"Whoa." Fu's comment echoed the only thing that could be formed in the minds of the others.

"You like?" He gave himself a once-over before looking at the others with a smirk and a playful glint in his eyes reminiscent of one Toad Sage. "I wasn't sure if I should have gone with the muffler, but I think it works."

The rest of the group could only stare in shock at the former Mizukage, momentarily robbed of the ability to form coherent thoughts.

"Your scar is gone." Gaara, however, was not like the others, and had gotten past his shock quite quickly and stated what was on everyone's mind.

"Yes." Yagura looked slightly uncomfortable at the topic. "It was a reminder of the control that bastard had over me, and I'd rather _not_ keep it."

His response pulled everyone out of their stupor, with Naruto getting to the point.

"So you said that there was a way for us to be able to control our Biju." At Yagura's nod, he continued. "Where do we go to learn it?"

Yagura gave a creepy smile, unnerving all who gazed upon it, before answering.

"My personal training grounds."


	15. To Be A Jinchuuriki

The sky was filled with clouds, dimming the day so that everything seemed almost... dusty. Sunlight was scarce, as the clouds weren't willing to scatter to the winds. Yagura, standing at the helm of the boat he'd... _procured_ from an elderly sailor for a reasonable price. When he'd done so, Yagura was regaled with the rumor that was bound to spread across the Elemental Nations: the death of the Yondaime Mizukage and the release of the Sanbi no Kyodaigame- the Three-Tailed Giant Turtle.

To say that Yagura was shocked wasn't completely right. In all honesty, he was almost amused that a simple change of clothes and removal of that cursed scar made him completely unrecognizable- though it had been his intention when he did so, he hadn't expected his purported 'death' to make it so that he could walk around in public, using his real name, and not get recognized.

Looking out over the deck, where Naruto and Utakata could be found 'conversing' with each other, if it could be called that, Yagura reached out with his chakra sense to locate the others. Han was down below, though he had distanced himself from Fu and Gaara, who appeared to be having another one of their conversations. Roshi was-

"I don't trust you." Ah. Yes. Roshi had just entered the wheelhouse.

"I don't expect you to, yet." Yagura replied, and he absentmindedly shrugged off the penetrating glare the older man was giving him. "Though your distrust does not explain why you and your brother are with us on this journey."

"Me and Han have most likely been declared either missing-nin or dead by now. Returning would do no one any good." Roshi tersely answered. "Though that doesn't mean that we'll do anything you want."

"I am not the man you think I am." Yagura cut straight to the point.

"That... isn't what I meant." Roshi sounded hesitant, and Yagura chose to reveal the truth of the matter- he'd never been one to keep information from an ally or lie to those who he considered his equals.

"Regardless, that _is_ why you're here, isn't it?" Though he'd phrased it like a question, Yagura meant it to be a statement. He'd never make any progress with Roshi if the two kept going off-topic.

"I just don't believe that Madara's alive after all this time." Roshi said. "But... if you were going to lie to us, it would have been more believable to have told us something simpler."

"I did not lie to any of you." Yagura replied, not turning his head away from the sea ahead.

"You're a Kage." Roshi stated, moved to stand beside Yagura. "Lying comes naturally to you- it's what politicians do best, after all."

Roshi's voice had gone bitter at the end of that last statement, but Yagura found the reason behind it to be slightly relevant to the conversation.

"Your father-in-law is the Sandaime Tsuchikage, correct?" Yagura reached out, seeing if Roshi would take the bait.

"What of it?"

"And your grandfather was Muu, the Nidaime Tsuchikage."

"Died long before I was born." Roshi waved off the question. "What's your point?"

"My point is that you find contempt for the title of Kage." Yagura said. "Most likely because of the rumors that you were a shoo-in for Yondaime Tsuchikage."

"I never wanted the job." Roshi answered. "And I'm not one for leading."

"Still," Yagura conceded. "You lead these kids pretty well."

"I just picked a destination- never really lead them." Roshi said. "If anyone's the leader it's the gaki or Gaara."

 _That_ statement caught Yagura's interest.

"Why do you say that?"

"Han, as well-rounded as he is, is too emotional to put it aside when the time comes. And he always stays out of groups whenever he can- doesn't like them. Prefers to be alone." Roshi explained. "Fu, well, she's a bit too... _odd_ , for the role of a leader. She's more likely to leave you to die than help you."

"And what of Naruto and Gaara?" Yagura had to say, Roshi's logic seemed quite sound, given what little he knew of the group since meeting each of them.

"If the two of them worked together, they'd make great leaders." Roshi answered. "Gaara's got the levelheadedness and smarts to lead, but not the personality, which is where Naruto comes in."

"That is true." Yagura stated. He himself was a victim unto the blond's outgoing and, quite frankly, enrapturing personality. "He does present himself in a way that makes you want to side with him."

"Exactly." Roshi agreed, and Yagura wondered if the man was a little more trusting of him than before.

"And what do you think of me?" Yagura questioned. While it seemed like too soon to ask a question like that, in reality it was the best time to ask such a thing.

"You're a mystery." Roshi dead-panned, making Yagura look at the man in surprise. "And in the ninja world, mysteries like the kind you are get good Shinobi killed."

"I apologize for coming off like that." Yagura replied, averting his eyes away from Roshi. "I'd thought my intentions were quite clear, but it seems I was wrong."

"Damn straight." Roshi growled, making Yagura frown slightly.

"Just know that I really do want to help you." Yagura said, turning back to the task of steering the ship. "The only thing I want out of this is to get a chance to take a look at Naruto's seal. He's the only one of the Children not to have gone insane. I would also like to personally confirm that he's able to achieve one tailed form without going berserk."

"If that's all you wanted, then I can tell you myself that the gaki _can_ go into one tailed cloak. In fact, he and I were able to have a bit of a talk before it faded and he was knocked out." Roshi explained.

"What knocked him out?" Yagura would be lying if he said that he wasn't extremely curious to hear that story.

"The loss of the cloak." Roshi answered, and Yagura really did frown- Jinchuuriki usually did not lose consciousness from the dispersal of the Yokai cloak unless they were extremely taxed from the fight. Roshi seemed to notice the troubled look. "Something wrong?"

"Possibly, though I will need to look at Naruto's seal to know for sure." Yagura fixed his gaze upon the sea, occasionally looking at the compass to ensure he was heading the right way. Roshi appeared to be satisfied, though slightly concerned at Yagura's answer. Behind him, the sound of the door closing signaled the departure of Roshi.

_What kind of seal does that to a Jinchuuriki?_

~~***~~

Out on the deck, Naruto was in an argument with Utakata. Neither seemed to notice the slight chill in the air, nor the darkening sky.

"I'm just saying," Naruto countered. "If healing people is all you can do, then I don't see why you're as strong as you say you are."

Utakata was nearing the edge. He'd gotten roped into this argument though Naruto's curiosity about what he could do- and then proceeded to heckle him for his healing abilities.

"Healing others isn't the only thing I can do." Utakata retorted. "I'm also incredibly fast. My most promising student-" Utakata cut himself off before he could continue. As much as he'd moved on since Haku's death, he didn't feel ready talking about him just yet.

Of course, he hadn't counted on the persistent pestering of one Uzumaki Naruto.

"Your most promising student?" Naruto looked intrigued, like he'd just been given a problem to solve.

"I don't wanna talk about it." Utakata's dismissal seemed to have gone over Naruto's head, as he continued asking about Utakata's student.

"Oh come on!" Naruto whined some time later, as Utakata sedately ate his food- made by Han, who apparently was quite skilled in the culinary arts.

"No." Utakata took another bite of his yakisoba, savoring the flavors within the noodles- and failing at ignoring Naruto's pleading whine- before swallowing. "Fine."

"YES!" Naruto, several months ago, would have jumped up in the air, but not now. Now, Naruto simply loudly- though not _too_ loudly- declared his victory before waiting with little patience for Utakata to tell his story.

"So, you know that I was a hunter-nin before defecting, right?" At Naruto's nod, Utakata continued. "Well, the way we trained people was by having the experienced hunter-nin have new recruits shadow them for a few weeks, so that they know what to do. Sometimes, though, an apprentice is taken. For me, it was this young kid, who'd be a little older than you right now.

"Anyway, I taught this kid all I knew- how to travel at high speeds, to observe even the tiniest of details so you can exploit them, you name it I taught him it." Utakata took a sharp intake. This wasn't going to be pleasant. "But then, several months into the apprenticeship, Zabuza attempted to take Yagura's life- and the title of Mizukage- with several high-ranking Shinobi backing him. I was new to Yagura's guard at the time, but my apprentice was still with me. He died in the attack, killed by what seemed to have been an Ice Release jutsu."

"Ice Release?" Naruto sounded worried, and warning bells started going off in Utakata's head, but he was too into his grief to get past it. "Are you sure?"

"Yes." Utakata said, gaining a far-off look in his eyes as he remembered the blood from his apprentice that had turned to crimson ice. Remembered how Haku had been entirely whole, giving Utakata one of his kind-hearted smiles before being turned to tiny shards of ice that melted away. "He was killed by an Ice Release user."

"Do you know what the killer looked like?" Naruto's fear sent the alarm bells into overdrive, and Utakata started to take notice of them.

"No, why?" Utakata leveled with Naruto, giving the teen a hard look that would have broken lesser men. Naruto, however, quailed under the piercing gaze, garnering the attention of the others at the table.

"Well," Naruto squirmed under the looks he was receiving from the group, and it was only when Yagura intervened that Utakata got the answer he was dreading. "On my first C-Rank mission, it turned into and A-Rank when Zabuza and this kid were sent to kill our client. Both died on the mission, but the kid could do Ice Release jutsu and-" Naruto was stopped when Killer Intent flared wildly from Utakata, who was livid.

"And..." Utakata ground out through clenched teeth.

"The kid wasn't really into killing." Naruto said. "He didn't like it and tried to avoid it whenever possible."

A dark pit started to form in Utakata's stomach.

_It **can't** be!_

"His name was Haku."

Utakata's entire form shifted, and even _Yagura_ winced at the response.

_No..._

"Haku?" Utakata's voice came out wearied, belying the emotional weight that was crashing down on him. "About your size, brown eyes, black hair, looks like a girl?"

In the second that Naruto hesitated, Utakata got all the answer he needed. Slumping down, Utakata buried his face in the folds of his arms, letting out the tears he hadn't- couldn't shed for his student. Hunter-nin weren't allowed to let their emotions get in the way. Emotions clouded a ninja's judgement and every action, something hunter-nin _could not_ have happen.

"I'm sorry."

The words, though expected, were too much for Utakata. His grief had already been run through, leaving only the guilt- and anger because of it.

"Don't- don't say you're sorry." Utakata spoke through his cracked voice, looking at Naruto with bloodshot eyes. "You did nothing- _nothing_ \- to be sorry about." Utakata's voice went back to normal, though the grief was replaced with anger. Anger at himself for not noticing things that no one could have seen. Anger at Zabuza for taking away his beloved student. Anger at the Sanbi for creating Ice Release and the Yuki clan.

"He died protecting Zabuza." Naruto's voice carried across the table, reaching everyone's ears. "The two of them cared for each other, in the end. Zabuza went crazy with anger, even." Utakata looked up upon hearing about the last moments of the Demon of the Mist. Hearing that the two had died defending each other, and that Zabuza had wished to have been more like Haku, so that the two would meet again in the afterlife.

"Haku always did have a way in bringing out a person's emotions." Utakata chuckled, which turned into soft sobs as he started to realize the deeper meaning behind Haku's last words to him- "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine." Haku had known that he'd had to fake his death, and was trying to make sure that Utakata would be okay afterwards. Utakata stood, moving out of the galley and towards his room, before he felt a hand on his arm. Turning, he saw Naruto standing there with Yagura a few feet behind the boy.

"I'm sorry," Naruto began. "For having to tell you that. I just... thought you would want some sort of closure. I had no idea they were the same person. If it helps, he taught me my nindo- to become stronger to protect your loved ones. To never go back on my word."

And for the first time in years, Utakata smiled. A real, true smile.

_I hope you're happy wherever you are, Haku..._

 

~~***~~

Since that day, the mood surrounding everyone became- livelier. To fill out the odd silences during mealtimes, everyone started sharing stories of their times a ninja. Gaara gave them his life story, which made Naruto pull him into a full-body hug- something that Gaara's sand defense usually took as a threat, but did nothing to the blond. Gaara reluctantly hugged back, which made everyone unanimously decide that Gaara should not give hugs. Ever.

Utakata shared stories of how the more experienced hunter-nin would play jokes on the newbies- like having them infiltrate houses that turned out to occupy some of the more powerful Kunoichi of Kiri. Roshi and Han told stories from their childhood, including the idiotic traps they'd set up during the Third Great Shinobi World War, including ones that sent the victim into a pit full of sewage or honey, depending on the moods of the Iwa-nin. Fu told of past missions and engaged in conversation with the group, slowly learning that it was important for her to help them if any of them were injured- to help anyone injured get medical aid, either from Utakata or a medic-nin. Yagura told of his exploits with with Kaito-Sensei, who was a bit of a jokester- reminding Naruto of the pranks he used to pull before graduating.

"...And no one noticed until I was done that the faces had been painted." Naruto finished, causing everyone to chuckle at his antics. "But the hilarious part is I did it all in the middle of the day, in full view of the entire village, while wearing my old ninja outfit, a bright orange jumpsuit." The group collapsed in laughter, though Fu was only giggling and Gaara allowed a tiny smirk to adorn his face- the duo's equivalent of outright laughter. Suddenly Han's voice- for he had replaced Yagura at the helm after making the meal- reverberated through the entire ship.

"We're approaching land."

The group quited down, moving with the speed befitting of the Shinobi they were to clear the table and move into the wheelhouse or onto the deck. They shared few words, watching in anticipation as the morning mist cleared away, revealing the island they were heading towards.

"We've arrived." Yagura's voice came from the speakers, signaling that he was at the helm once more. "Given our speed, we should reach it within the hour."

The rest of the trip was spent out on deck on in the wheelhouse, talking about what parts of their skills they intend on improving in addition to learning to control their Biju.

The hour passed by quickly, giving way to a low island that seemed to have more jungle than proof of habitation. Moving into the harbor, the view gave way to the dock, a simple wooden thing leading inland. Stopping up against the dock, the supplies were sealed way into several scrolls for each of them to carry, lightening the load considerably.

"This entire island was gifted to the Uzumaki that sealed the Rokubi and Sanbi into their first Jinchuuriki. It contains all the sealing secrets that remain of the clan, as the rest were destroyed when Uzushio was wiped off the map." Yagura explained. "It is also here that I was trained in secret. No one else knows of it's location, save for those that went here in the past. Only the Shodai Mizukage knew of it, and he took it with him to the grave."

"But how'd you contact them when a new Jinchuuriki was needed?" Roshi asked, looking around at the lush green of the forest, having grown to such lengths in the cool environment.

"The Uzumaki knew when they were needed on their own." Yagura answered, leading them down the dirt path. "No one except them knew how they did it. Not even Kaito-Sensei told me how it was done, as he said that it was the second most closely guarded secret of the Uzumaki clan."

From the forest appeared a stone wall, as clear and clean as the day it was built. It was almost as large as the wall surrounding Konoha.

"Welcome... to the Uzumaki clan compound." Yagura turned and bowed with a flourish.

"That's it?" Naruto said with equal parts disbelief and disappointment. He'd expected something more from the place people from his clan lived in. Yagura stood and fixed Naruto with a hard stare, which the teen shrugged off with a bit of effort. "Sorry. Just... I kinda expected, I dunno..."

"Something a bit fancier than a giant wall?" Gaara supplied, appearing put out himself.

"Belittle this wall all you want, it is the living embodiment of _the_ most closely guarded secret of the Uzumaki clan." Yagura said, reaching out and opening the gate, which slid open as though the years of disuse had never happened. Come inside with me."

Giving each other looks- all of which unsure- Naruto hardened his face and stepped forth.

"What's the point of coming all this way if we don't learn how to control our Biju?" Naruto's words hit the Jinchuuriki, who looked at the teen in surprise before mirroring his expression and moving to join Yagura inside the compound.

The doors swung closed, and a shimmer went in the air, sending a pulse within the walls that had all the Jinchuuriki on edge.

"What was that?" Roshi demanded, which Yagura smirked in reply.

"That is the greatest seal the Uzumaki clan created." He answered. "It within these walls that I learned to fully harness the Sanbi's power."

"It's a barrier." Han said.

"The most powerful barrier in all of creation." Yagura elaborated. "Capable of stopping any and all of the Biju from getting past- into or out of it."

"Explain." Gaara's terse statement had nods of agreement.

"Come with me and I'll explain on the way." Yagura said, leading them into the compound, which they barely noticed.

The houses were few and far between, and the place consisted more of courtyards than actual buildings. The houses themselves were rather fancy, having entire pillars surrounding them, carved with intricate designs that- Naruto pointed out in shock- were seals.

"The Elemental Nations seems to hold the belief that the number of tails designates how strong or weak the Biju are- but that's completely wrong." Yagura explained. "The tails and different appearances are so that we can tell each of them apart. In reality, they hold the same amount of power- a little over one tail.

"The misconception of more tails equals more power is because the more tails allowed the Biju to cause more destruction with each swipe of the tail. The Uzumaki clan, which has it's own legends in how the Biju came to be, realized this and set about creating the ultimate barrier to protect entire cities from the Biju. They decided to try this out by creating the first Hidden Village."

"But the Shodai Hokage wasn't an Uzumaki." Naruto said, remembering that Konoha was the first Hidden Village to be created.

"Officially, Konoha was the first Hidden Village. Unofficially, however, the first real Hidden Village was Uzushio." Yagura elaborated. "But because they were so small in power, they didn't let others know of their prowess in sealing- and the fact that they'd succeeded in their quest."

"So it was their sealing that proved to be their downfall, in the end." Gaara said, and Yagura nodded.

"Exactly. In the Second Great Shinobi World War, Uzushio's sealing knowledge became known, and the other Hidden Villages worked to destroy it and kill all within." They neared the center of the compound, a large clearing with seal markings upon the ground. "What people don't know is that, over the generations, Uzumaki had left Uzushio, meaning that the clan can never really be destroyed completely.

"Now, about the barrier, the Uzumaki realized that to make such a complex thing required an enormous space to create it, with microseals within the seal to ensure that it did everything they wanted it to do." Yagura stopped in the middle of the cobblestones, turning to face the group. "So, the only way that they could really do this, is by turning the entire city into the seal."

"What?" Naruto couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"Look down. Notice that the entire inside of the compound is granite or cobblestone. The way that it seems to have been laid out in weird patterns is the seal itself." Yagura's arms spread out, and he looked almost proud at the entire place. " _This_ is the greatest secret of the Uzumaki clan."

"But..." Naruto looked around. "How'd they keep it from breaking down after all this time?"

"Special space/time seals that ensure that everything inorganic inside the walls don't deteriorate." Yagura finished. "Making it the perfect place for you to learn as I did, how to harness the power of your Biju.

"But first, I want to get a look at your seal." Yagura's expression turned serious.

"Why?" Naruto looked creeped out.

"Because you appear unable to properly draw on your Biju's chakra."

Naruto stood there, feeling slightly violated as Yagura intently studied his seal. While he had no problems showing it to anybody, it was just how Yagura was looking at it- like it was some mystery that needed solving- that scared him.

"So that's it." Yagura murmured, stepping back to get a good view of the entire seal.

"What?" Naruto was almost dreading the answer.

"It seems that, in order to keep you sane, the Yondaime chose to seal away half of the Kyuubi in the Shinigami. The pair of Four Elements seals you have isn't the problem- they work perfectly and the method is one of the strongest seals a Jinchuuriki can have." Yagura sighed. "But that's the problem. You've got an immensely strong seal holding back half a Biju."

"Which means..." Roshi drew out that last word in the hopes of having Yagura elaborate.

"It means..." Yagura sighed. "That we have to end the Dead Demon Consuming Seal."

"But won't that mean that the seal will break?" Naruto was freaking out a lot more on the inside than he was on the outside.

"I've already got a seal that we can replace it with- the Steel Dungeon." Yagura explained. "It's the same seal I have, which is one of the stronger ones to hold a Biju."

"Even so, the Dead Demon Consuming Seal is a deal with the Shinigami, something no one can break." Roshi said, more for the sake of the others than the group.

"The deal was done and has been paid for." Yagura answered. "Namikaze saw to that. All we'll be doing is altering the terms."

"And how do you propose we do that?" Roshi growled.

"We die."


	16. Ghost

"So how is this gonna work again?" Naruto asked, standing in only his boxers, the seal fully visible. They stood within the main house of the Uzumaki compound, and Yagura said that he needed fresh, clean space to work in to create the exact seal to replace the Dead Demon Consuming seal with the Steel Dungeon seal.

That had been several days ago, giving the others enough time to get a good look around. Naruto, once he'd calmed down enough to do so, was enraptured with how the people of his clan (and he still was awestruck at saying that he _had a clan_ ) lived. It seemed that they were stuck-up pricks, but Naruto didn't mind- if he had lived in a place like this compound, there was no way he _couldn't_ have turned out as a stuck-up prick. Every building had a sort of regal feel to them, and Naruto felt like he was _home_. Even though he'd grown up in Konoha, and had felt like the Hidden Village was his home, there was just something _more_ about being in the place where your family lived, where they laughed, where they cried, where a piece of them could always be found.

Naruto didn't know he'd wanted that. After only several hours in the compound, however, he didn't know how he'd ever lived without it.

"It's like this," Yagura's voice snapped Naruto back into reality. "Namikaze, thinking that he could keep you sane, summoned the Shinigami and took half of Kyuubi with him to the grave. Now, he used a pair of Four Elements seals to seal the remaining half of Kyuubi into you, and bound them together with the Dead Demon Consuming seal."

"But you haven't explained why we need to die." Naruto said, laying down so that Yagura could write the seals over the teen's body.

"The Dead Demon Consuming seal is too strong a binder, and the unstable Yokai from having half a Biju sealed within you will ultimately drive you into an early grave, if you keep on using it as is." Yagura explained.

"But Kyuubi's Yokai heals me! How can it hurt me if it does that?" Naruto questioned, raising his head so that he could see Yagura.

"The regenerative powers come from the Biju itself, not it's Yokai. The reason you lose consciousness after using the cloak is because of the strain put on your body as the healing fights off the Yokai. Quite frankly, I'm appalled that Namikaze would do that to you."

"Because a Jinchuuriki needs to use it's Biju, right." Naruto's voice became solemn at the turn in the conversation, and Yagura hoped that the teen would find the solace he needed before it was too late.

"Usually." Yagura answered, keeping oddly vague. "But getting back on point, the Dead Demon Consuming seal was meant to doom two souls to the bowels of the Shinigami, and Namikaze improperly used it to seal away half of Kyuubi, manipulating the jutsu in his favor. It was never meant to create Jinchuuriki."

"And we're gonna die to meet the Shinigami and get that half back."

"Yes."

"Oh." Naruto laid his head back down before it shot back up. "Wait. How're we gonna die if we can't actually die?"

"What?" Yagura thought Naruto's statement through in his head until it made sense- as Jinchuuriki, it was their lives that kept the Biju sealed, which were released upon their deaths. "Well, the two of us won't really be dead."

"Huh?" Yagura sighed, hoping to not have to explain.

"A seal will be put on you so your heart will stop beating, making you die. Now, the seal will only last 2 minutes, which means we have to act fast." Yagura said, finishing the complex array that would be used to replace Naruto's seal. "As for me, I'll have a similar seal place on me, so that I'll have a near-death experience."

"Why do I have to die, but you don't?" Naruto lifted his head as high as it could go. "And why 2 minutes?"

"Because when the seal fades and your heart starts up again, you'll come back to life with the entirety of Kyuubi sealed within you. I don't need that, meaning I'll have a near-death experience while you get the full thing. As for 2 minutes, your brain can only survive a maximum of 3 minutes after death before hope of being brought back is gone. After 3 minutes, your brain dies."

~~***~~

"The Sanbi knows what's going to happen, and will ensure that nothing happens to me in the meantime." Yagura explained to Roshi, who was in charge while Yagura was out. "Naruto has been restrained and everything is set up. All you have to do is make sure that both of us returns before the three minute mark."

"Got it." Roshi mock-saluted Yagura, who rolled his eyes before lying down on the ground next to the complex array, where Naruto lay in leather straps tying him to the floor. Above the teen Utakata stooped, ready to begin the process.

"Good." Yagura said, sharing one final look with Naruto before Roshi and Utakata went through a short sequence of seals and slammed their hands on the seals over both their hearts.

~~***~~

2 minutes, 59 seconds

Naruto dropped to his knees, taking great gulps of air, even though it did nothing to quell that he felt nothing. Looking around, he saw that he was in the middle of the seal array, with everyone moving slowly.

_Did it work?_

"Hey!" Naruto's voice echoed out of his throat, and Yagura answered him from behind.

"It worked." Whipping his head around, Naruto saw Yagura standing next to him. "Look down and try not to panic."

Shifting his head down, Naruto saw-

"Holy-!" Yagura's hand clamped down over Naruto's mouth, who, though muffled, was still able to finish his exclaim.

"Quiet! We are in the realm of the Shinigami. If it so desires, we could be removed from existence."

" **The mortal is correct.** " the voice, grating yet smoother than glass, came from behind the two, who stiffened and turned to face their quarry.

Standing over 10 feet in height, the Shinigami's unruly white hair almost hid it's eyes, gray and rippled, which could only be seen because of the horns sticking up out of it's skull, the same deadened purple as the rest of it's body. Barely covering it's bony form, which hid none of it's skeleton, was an open kimono, the same white as it's long hair. Attached to it's waist was a tanto- the same one that allows it to condemn souls to an eternity of despair within it's stomach.

" **You two are dead before your time.** " It said, looking at one and then the other like they were pieces of delicious food. " **When I am brought to the feet of people such as yourselves, often you lowly mortals wish me to do something.** "

"That's not quite true." Yagura said, bringing the full force of the Shinigami's attention upon him before Naruto spoke up.

"13 years ago you performed the Dead Demon Consuming seal, taking half of the Kyuubi into your stomach and sealing the other half inside of a child." The Shinigami swung it's head towards Naruto, it's hair shifting like it had a life all its own.

" **I have fulfilled that pathetic soul's desire in summoning me to place half of the Ninth Tail within you, young Namikaze.** " The Shinigami said, it's mouth not opening, yet the words reached them, but then it gave off a wicked smile, showing Naruto the teeth that consumes souls. " **Do you wish to join your father?** "

"N-no!" Naruto said, attempting to back away, but finding that the Shinigami's bony hand- more fingers than an actual hand- was gripping his shoulder tightly. "I want the other half of Kyuubi and you to remove your seal from me."

There was a sharp grating sound, like glass grinding into dust, and Naruto and Yagura found out that it was laughter.

" **And what do I get out of this?** " The Shinigami questioned, leaning down into the faces of the duo. " **You see, I cannot undo my seal without something in return.** "

Looking at Yagura in alarm, Naruto saw that the man was calm, and answered blithely.

"Naruto is the child of a Jinchuuriki."

" **Something quite rare, but what does that mean for me?** " The Shinigami looked bored, if that was even possible.

"I have a connection to Kyuubi." Naruto elaborated, though the Shinigami didn't appear interested in that knowledge. "How'd you like to break that connection and study it?"

 _That_ caught the interest of the Shinigami, who leaned in close to look into Naruto's eyes.

" **That... is almost sufficient. To know how such a thing works would be priceless knowledge. I have wanted control over all Nine of the Tails ever since their creation, but whenever one of them comes into my possession, they slip back into the world of the living.** " The Shinigami said, looking at the two. " **All that I require of you in return is to deal with the only foreseeable problem.** "

Reaching down with it's right hand, it unsheathed it's tanto and stabbed itself in the stomach. Naruto, for his part, was feeling quite sick at watching the Shinigami appear to perform Seppuku.

Pulling out the tanto, it was covered a stomach-churning mix of red and yellow liquid before the yellow separated and fell onto the floor, where it reformed into a person.

" **You must deal with Namikaze.** "

~~***~~

2 minutes, 30 seconds

"Keep the chakra flow steady!" Roshi said, as they felt the flaring Yokai of the Sanbi and the half of Kyuubi's own Yokai attempt to take over Naruto's body. "If we let up on the suppressors, then the gaki's dead for real!"

"How do you suppose it's going?" Utakata said, trying to keep the Sanbi's Yokai under control. It was odd- the Sanbi seemed to be directing it's Yokai into the suppressors Roshi was using on Naruto's body. Suddenly, there was a small pulse, and Utakata found himself lying on his back, the Sanbi's Yokai reaching out towards...

The chakra suppressing seal on Naruto's body. Upon reaching it, the suppressor glowed brightly, and Kyuubi's Yokai disappeared completely.

_What?_

 

~~***~~

2 minutes, 15 seconds

The figure stood up, coughing out whatever he had blocking his airways before it seemed to come out.

Namikaze Minato stood tall over Yagura and Naruto, glancing at the former before setting his eyes on the latter.

"Naru-" The name was interrupted as Yagura's fist found itself lodged in Minato's gut, causing the man to double over.

"Is it possible to kill him when we're like this?" Yagura asked the Shinigami, who dismissively turned towards Naruto with the red-coated tanto.

" **No, but as he is, Namikaze's soul will fade from existence in time. Fighting him will make him fade faster.** " The Shinigami approached Naruto, who started to back away in fear. Yagura turned his attention back towards Minato, who'd gotten his breath back.

"What-" Minato's question was cut off by a hard punch to the face, sending him flying though a doorway and into an adjacent room.

"Good." Yagura said, moving to take down Minato- and get the answer to a question that had been bothering him for quite some time. Landing in the room, which was a study, Yagura looked around the room for Minato before he was nearly impaled by a tri-pronged Kunai. There was a brief flash of light before Minato was found holding the Kunai and slashing upwards.

Yagura jumped back, readying for when Minato did that once more.

"Tell me what is happening." Minato's voice was even, controlled, like that of a seasoned ninja.

"I, along with Uzumaki Naruto, have come to make Kyuubi whole once more." Yagura answered, settling into a loose taijutsu stance. "My turn: why did you turn him into a Jinchuuriki?"

"Because I needed to!" Minato said, moving to attack Yagura, who parried the blows. "Why do you want to make the Kyuubi whole?"

"Because Naruto needs it to be, if he is to harness it's power fully." Yagura replied, jump-kicking the blond man, who blocked, though was sent back from the force. "Why did you kill your wife?"

Minato stopped, looking appalled at his opponent.

"I didn't kill Kushina." Yagura raised an eyebrow upon hearing that.

"You're wrong. By having Naruto as a child, you ensured that Kushina would die and he would become the next Jinchuuriki for Kyuubi."

"You're wrong!" Minato let fly a hail of Kunai, though only a half-dozen of them were the special Hiraishin Kunai. "I was trying to find out how to stop that from happening."

"And you succeeded. Your son is the only Child to have drawn upon enough Yokai to create the one tailed cloak and stayed sane." Yagura dodged all the Kunai, making sure that the Hiraishin Kunai were deflect to the far edges of the study. "I presume you're happy."

"What?" Minato stood there, looking confused.

"You must be proud. You died a hero, condemning your son to a miserable life, but so long as Konoha has the power of a Child who can control their Biju, you're happy." Yagura stopped fighting, though he didn't let his guard down.

"That wasn't why I did it! Someone attacked while Kushina was in labor, threatened us by taking Naruto hostage. He released Kyuubi and set it upon Konoha!" Minato's answer had taken Yagura by surprise, but he was professional enough not to let it notice.

"What did this person look like?"

"I didn't get a good look- he was wearing an orange mask. I think he was Uchiha Madara, but that's impossible."

Yagura could barely hold back his surprise at that comment, but expertly hid it by looking Minato hard in the eye.

"If that was true, then why try to kill Naruto?" Minato didn't appear to have expected such a question.

"What are you- I didn't try to kill my son!" Yagura sighed.

"You attempted to kill him the second you chose to seal half a Biju within him." Yagura explained. "The unstable Yokai would have sent him to an early grave."

"But-" Minato looked stricken, and Yagura chose that moment to shorten Minato's life as a spirit some more.

~~***~~

1 minute, 59 seconds

" **It sounds like they are having quite the battle, doesn't it?** " The Shinigami said, looking at Naruto like he was some sort of object to be toyed with.

"Yeah..." Naruto answered, still wary of the god in front of him. Eying the red coating on the tanto, Naruto almost dreaded knowing how he was going to have that half of Kyuubi placed within him. "That half of Kyuubi, it's just gonna rejoin with the other half, right? It won't become a piece of me, will it?"

Something in the gleam the Shinigami had unnerved Naruto in all the wrong ways.

" **Scared of becoming a Biju, are you?** " The Shinigami said, looking at the boy with more interest than before. " **Scared of losing yourself to that beast? Of finding that nothing of the old you exists anymore?** "

Naruto didn't know that it was possible to feel so scared.

" **Don't worry. I am the living embodiment of death- the day that happens will be the day I come for your soul.** " The Shinigami's voice seemed to take on a level of ecstasy that had Naruto wondering not for the first time if this was all worth it. " **And oh, what a soul it is. So pure and innocent. I do so hope you remain the same when you die. I'd like nothing better than to keep it to myself, studying it, picking it apart piece by piece just to see what makes it tick.** "

"R-really?" Naruto wanted to run. To keep running and never look back.

" **Of course. A soul like yours is once in a millennia. Every time they come along, I enjoy myself immensely when I come for it. Yours will be no different.** "

Naruto wasn't quite sure what to say to that, but apparently his face belied his every emotion to the Shinigami.

" **Perhaps it would calm you if I show you just how powerful I am, so there's no undue difficulty.** " The Shinigami's bony hand suddenly found itself holding Naruto's shoulder tightly, almost stabbing the boy. With its' other arm, the Shinigami waved the glowing red tanto in the air, creating a mirror. As it was forming Naruto felt every bone in his body seem to melt, causing his face to erupt in a silent scream until the burning pain was replaced with an icy one, much worse than the previous. Hard snaps, like the breaking of tree branches could be heard within the boy's body until they stopped, leaving Naruto on the ground and gasping for air. " **Look in the mirror, boy, and see just why I hold the title of God of Death.** "

The Shinigami's voice held nothing but malice of the worst kind, and when Naruto looked into the mirror, the first thing that drew his eyes was the Shinigami's face- contorted into a sneer the likes of which none would- none could gaze upon without dying for fear of having it turned upon them.

The second thing that Naruto noticed was his own reflection.

Pallid, wrinkled skin didn't cover him so much as seem to be draped over his skeleton like a too-large cloth over a statue. His eyes, sunken to the point that they were almost empty eye sockets, were whitening before his gaze to the point where nothing of the blue irises or black pupil could be seen as having ever existed. His hands, holding them up in front of him, Naruto saw that they were shaking uncontrollably, and holding them still was painful. Getting up onto his feet, Naruto was brought to the floor completely as white-hot pain erupted from his hip, searing his entire body as it radiated up through his spine and out into each of his organs. Raising his shaking hands, Naruto started coughing, each involuntary contraction of his diaphragm hurting his chest to no end. From his lips blood dribbled down onto and between his fingers to land in a growing puddle on the floor.

And as he was staring at the growing puddle of blood coming from his mouth, Naruto found himself on his feet, standing as he was before the pain had hit him. To the side, the mirror had disappeared, the puddle of blood with it. Looking down at his hands, he burst into silent tears upon seeing that they were back to normal, and the pain of his entire body was no longer in agonizing pain.

" **I am keeper of lives, deciding who lives and who dies; who ages with grace and who becomes the ugliest creature in all of existence by the time they near the end. Do not think for a second you have any modicum of a hint of a whisper of a chance against me Mortal.** " The Shinigami kept up the look for several more seconds while Naruto nodded, the tears drying up and his face as it was before the conversation had started. Then, just as sudden as it was there, the Shinigami's face returned to the almost impassive visage it seemed to prefer.

"It's done." Yagura came back, covered in blood. "Namikaze's soul is no more."

The Shinigami's expression was gleeful, as it turned and, in a single movement, stabbed Naruto in the gut.

~~***~~

20 seconds

"It's almost time!" Utakata looked at Yagura's body, where the Yokai had suddenly stopped.

Yagura's chest moved, and the man lurched up, gasping for air. Utakata ran to his aid, but was shoved aside by the man, who ran over to the seal, running his hand through the necessary hand seals required.

"Get back! I need to start the process!" Yagura slammed his hands down on the ground, sending his chakra out to stabilize the seal as the Dead Demon Consuming seal began to be replaced, the swirl fading away, taking the pair of Four Elements seals with it. In their place was-

"Who the hell are you!"

A woman.

"My god." Roshi's voice came from behind Yagura, who was staring at the mysterious ghostly form of a red-haired woman. "The Hot-Blooded Habanero."

"That's me. Who're you?" The woman, who appeared familiar to Yagura, set her glare on all of them.

"I'm Tadashii Yagura, former Yondaime Mizukage. Yourself?" Yagura introduced himself, setting the woman's glare on him in particular.

"Uzumaki Kushina." Ah. That's why she looked familiar. Naruto certainly got his mother's build in contrast to his father's looks. "What are you doing to my child?"

At her feet (or what seemed to constitute as her feet, as she was more like the less-defined steam creatures Han was wont to make) the last vestiges of the Dead Demon Consuming seal steadfastly refused to disappear.

"We are ensuring that he is able to fully utilize the entirety of Kyuubi instead of a half-Biju." Kushina looked lost at the explanation, and her feet became a little less defined.

"What- half-Biju?"

"Naruto had half a Biju sealed within him." Roshi said. "Messed with his health every time he drew on the unstable Yokai. Was gonna drive him into an early grave if it wasn't fixed."

"They're right." Utakata said. "I know enough about medicine to have noticed the signs of chakra poisoning."

"Chakra poisoning?" Kushina wasn't the only was confused upon hearing that phrase. Yagura and Roshi didn't know what it was called- at least Yagura didn't know it by name.

"It's when foreign chakra invades a person's body. Because the chakra isn't medical in nature, it attacks the body and chakra system. You can find it if you take a look at the victim's chakra coils or, failing that, you can sense it when the patient uses chakra- usage draws on the foreign chakra the same as the native chakra." Utakata explained, thankful that Han had led Fu and Gaara to the far end of the compound to oversee their training. The two younger teens, close to Naruto, wouldn't react nicely to that news. "It can be cured by either removing it completely, which can't be done, or by altering either the foreign chakra itself or the chakra coils so that the body recognizes the chakra and no longer is attacked by it."

Kushina's feet were gone, her legs following suit as Utakata explained chakra poisoning. Yagura took notice of it, seeing that the remaining pieces of the Dead Demon Consuming seal disappeared at the same rate as Kushina's body.

"Oh." Kushina looked down before noticing Naruto's unconscious form. Her face softened, and tears began to form at the edges of her eyes. "He looks so peaceful. What's he like?"

Yagura was thrown for a loop. He hadn't spent enough time around the teen to be able to properly answer that question, and he doubted that any of the others-

"He's a little headstrong and brash, but means well and he's learning to think before acting. Or speaking. Or anything, actually." Roshi answered, looking at Kushina longingly. "Met him in a casino."

"A casino?" Kushina' face became devoid of emotion, and Roshi appeared to have taken notice of the wrong conclusion reached.

"Oh it's not what you think- he was just playing for a little extra pocket change. And the bastard took me for all I had." Roshi backtracked so that Kushina knew the context. "The gaki doesn't really like gambling at all- he told me that he doesn't get it, and the few times he's gambled he wound up winning a lot of ryo. Lucky bastard." Roshi muttered at the end, and Kushina's face seemed to smile at hearing that.

"That's good." She absentmindedly said, looking back down at Naruto, whose long unruly hair covered his eyes from view. She reached down and parted his bangs to reveal his upper face- and the fact that he had no Hitai-Ate on him. "Is he a ninja?" Her voice became frantic, and she looked at the trio in the room in desperation. Yagura knew why he remained silent- he did not want to expose the truth to the scared mother.

"Yes and no." Utakata answered, and everyone turned to the lanky man for elaboration. "Naruto's a Genin of Konoha, but he didn't have a lot of love for the job- too boring, he said." Utakata chuckled a bit. "Guess he didn't like performing D-Ranks or the more boring C-Rank missions."

Yagura came unto the impression that Utakata was a _very_ skilled liar.

"My understanding of it is he got bored and requested indefinite leave to travel around." Utakata explained with a wave of his hand. "That was a few months ago. Since then, he's... brought all of us together. Your son is quite the charmer- and extremely scary when need be."

Kushina's torso was starting to fade, and there was barely anything left of the Dead Demon Consuming seal. Yagura prepped to take that time as an opportunity to-

"Would you tell him I love him?"

Kushina's question was unexpected, and her torso was completely gone by the time Yagura answered.

"We will. Anything else?" Damn it, he was throwing away the limited time he had to get the answer he needed. But Yagura would sooner be condemned to the bowels of the Shinigami if Naruto didn't get this message from his mother.

"Tell him to find someone to love." Kushina's head was all that was left, and even that was disappearing. "It's the only way for people like us to be truly happy."

And with that, Kushina was gone, moved on to the afterlife. In her place was the glowing lines that made up the Steel Dungeon, settling into a formation similar to the previous seal.

~~***~~

The week following the replacement was an almost silent affair. Naruto had gone comatose, his body needing "to adjust to the change in how it draws upon Kyuubi's Yokai" as stated by Utakata.

Yagura, however, knew otherwise.

When Naruto had been gifted with the remaining half of Kyuubi, some _thing_ had been drawn out of him in its stead. Yagura didn't get a good look at what, exactly, it was- he'd been brought back to life before it could happen, and given Naruto's near instantaneous return with him, the Shinigami's warping of time was at play.

God only knew what the teen witnessed.

Without Naruto's frightening need to train all the time (something that worried Yagura, if the teen considered training all day everyday life), the group got to really know each other.

Utakata had partnered up with Han, the two complimenting each other quite nicely- the gentile giant who preferred brute force and the lanky, hot-headed man who fought with finesse.

The fact that Utakata's attempt at cooking resulted in a blackened mass of _something_ had little credence to why the skilled cook was always close by.

Fu had taken to seeking Roshi for aid, wishing to learn the "proper way to communicate with annoyances", as she so eloquently put it.

Roshi had locked her in one of the houses with him once he figured out what she meant by annoyances. The two hadn't been seen since, though Roshi's angry yells could be heard if one took the time to listen closely.

Yagura was delving into the Uzumaki clan seals. He'd always been fascinated by them ever since becoming a Jinchuuriki- as a child, he'd marveled at how it was possible for a creature the size of mountains to be imprisoned by a tiny child, which was one of the reasons that Kaito-Sensei had taken him as an apprentice. While he knew _of_ the barrier, he didn't know _how_ it worked- the knowledge was hidden in a blood sealed compartment, only capable of being opened by someone with Uzumaki blood- and he'd gotten Naruto's consent for the teen donate a bit of his blood for the seals user to deactivate any blood seals he came across.

Feeling a presence across from him, Yagura looked up from the seal he was studying- a prototype for a way to make the Biju Barrier mobile- to see Gaara staring at him.

"I'd like you to teach me." Yagura raised an eyebrow at the red-head's audacity.

"I've already taken Naruto on as my apprentice. Why should I even teach you?" Yagura answered. "What would I teach you, for that matter?"

"Uzumaki- Naruto." Gaara caught himself, and Yagura internally applauded the teen's usage of his friend's surname. Gaara had seemed closed off from all emotions at first glance, but showed that he was learning to get in touch with them. "Naruto does not have the patience to learn any of the sealing arts. I doubt you'll be able to teach him anything of use, despite his potential latent skill with sealing. I, however, do have the patience to properly learn the sealing arts thoroughly."

"That is a good argument." Yagura conceded. The teen certainly had the guts and focus needed, but he had yet to show the one thing required of any burgeoning seals master. "But I doubt you have what it takes to by my student."

"Then you are wrong." Gaara forcefully stated. "I am more than capable of learning what you have to teach, given the chance."

 _There_ it was. Kaito-Sensei had said that the mark of a seals master was that they were always willing to learn something new, no matter how good or skilled they got.

"Meet me back here in 24 hours for us to start. I'll have everything set up for you by then."

~~***~~

Naruto sat up, gasping for breath. Automatically, Naruto reached his hands down into his stomach, feeling for something that wasn't there. Once it was established that he was in one piece, Naruto let his hands fall down to his sides, letting out a ragged breath he barely knew he'd been holding in.

"Hey, hey." Someone said to his right, and Naruto looked over in surprise to find Utakata. "You're all right. The new seal's up and appears to be working beautifully."

"How long've I been out?" Naruto questioned, as the sun appeared to be low in the sky- to the East, if his internal sense of direction was right.

"A little over a week." Utakata answered. "Your body needed the time to rest up and get used to the new seal." His handed started to glow green, though the green chakra encasing his hand shimmered, like it was unstable. "Your chakra seems to be running smoother now, and your reserves have taken a dip without the constant stream of Yokai flowing into them."

"Is that...?" Naruto trailed off, motioning towards the shimmering green chakra covering Utakata's hand.

"The Rokubi's a slug, so every time I use a medical technique I draw on its' Yokai. Because of the natural healing properties it's Yokai provides." Utakata added at the end.

"Right." Naruto nodded, though his head was elsewhere.

When the Shinigami had removed it's tanto from him, with it came a mirror image of him- identical in every way except for the eyes. The eyes were a creepy black-on-black.

The mirror-image had been spouting obscenities, screaming at Naruto to stop what was happening. It had been screaming in terror and anger that Naruto was weak without him- that he was nothing and would never have control of Kyuubi's Yokai without him.

The sight had haunted his nightmares the entire time he was out, and was sure to haunt him for weeks, if not longer.

"And since you're awake, we can start on that Biju control training- and creating a life for you outside of training." Utakata's tone was almost like an adult reprimanding a child, and Naruto gave him a small smile in return. It didn't matter if he no longer had that connection to Kyuubi- he'd control the Fox no matter what, or he wasn't Uzumaki Naruto.


	17. Reasoning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eight lives, as they settle down.

"WRONG!" Roshi yelled at Fu. "That is _not_ how you greet anyone!"

The girl sighed in defeat before tuning out the red-head across from her. She'd just explained how she usually acknowledged the existence of new annoyances ("People! They are called _people_!") and Roshi was angry, for some odd reason.

Naming them by the different ways they were connected to her (teammate, client, teacher, superior) was how she'd always referred to people- though it was quite irritating to other people when she was talking about previous teammates and clients. It was how she'd been treated all her life, being called names that led her to an apparently wrong conclusion.

Fu figured herself as being a Thing, and anything that wasn't like her was an Annoyance- always getting in her way and impeding her progress in some form.

Then she'd met fellow Things- Jinchuuriki was the official term, not Thing.

And they acted just like Annoyances- even going on to seem to 'befriend' them.

Fu had never been so confused- none more-so than the Jinchuuriki she found herself physically attracted to, Uzumaki Naruto.

The existence of a double-name like the Annoyances did not bother her in the slightest- somehow, she felt all the more attracted to him.

Though they weren't double-names, they were clan and family names, signifying the familial relationship to another. And they were 'humans', not Annoyances.

Everyone, including herself, was a 'human'.

That was the part she'd been speechless about.

And Roshi had been incensed about too, if his angry mutterings about "razing Taki into dust" were anything to go by.

Fu had not understood what he was so angry about- she was a Thing- no, a Jinchuuriki, and as such was expected to live and die for the Shinobi village she resided in.

And she'd never liked it. She didn't know why, but she just _hated_ having to do all those idiotic things with all those Annoyances- no, 'humans'.

She was changing, and Fu didn't know if it was for better or worse.

And that scared her as much as she found herself attracted to the reluctant Uzumaki- another point of contention within herself. She'd done all she could to present herself as a suitable female for mating, but the boy had persisted in the two of them courting.

_And he has yet to do anything himself!_

Fu seriously wondered if he was "playing hard to get", as the female populace was wont to talk of when discussing the opposite sex.

"Are you even listening to me?" Roshi's shaking of the girl snapped her back to the situation at hand, and she sighed again.

Learning this was confusing (and she still didn't quite grasp the importance of it), but if these teachings presented her with the most efficient way to court Naruto, then she would do her best.

_If only it wasn't so contradictory to all I know!_

 

~~***~~

Roshi went through the process of the correct way to introduce yourself to people a third time, his patience holding firm from his time in the 3rd Shinobi World War

His resolve, however, was not.

Fu believed that a Jinchuuriki's duty was to live and die servicing the Hidden Village they lived in.

The fact that she was still young enough to be taught the right way of thinking was all that kept him from going and turning Takigakure into a molten lake.

He'd originally taken Fu into one of the houses so he could properly (and privately) explain to her that people were not "Annoyances", and that she was not a "Thing" to service them.

It had ended with him locking down the entire residence so that he could pound into her the _right_ way of thinking, consequences be damned!

Thinking back on it, he probably shouldn't have done that. Having other people to practice and demonstrate proper etiquette was useful.

Though, given each of their odd quirks, that may not be the best idea.

Yagura, whenever proper etiquette was mentioned, got all anal retentive on everyone.

Han was polite enough, but he wasn't one to _demonstrate_ anything.

Utakata was way to laid back to be a good role model.

Naruto... Well, the kid was almost as bad as Fu in some respects.

Maybe he should've waited until the gaki woke up to start the etiquette lessons.

Oh, well. Live and learn. He'd just bring the gaki up to speed after he was done with Fu.

And Gaara. The younger red-head was a recovering psychotic and insomniac- the stories he'd told of his life were quite horrifying in their own right.

Oh yes, he would definitely team up with Yagura (beating down the guy's anal retentiveness when it came to etiquette beforehand, of course) and teach all three teens proper behavior. Even if it killed him.

And then that he noticed that Fu was barely listening to him.

It probably would kill him, too.

~~***~~

Utakata backed up, creating a protective bubble around him as the stew he was learning to make blew up, painting the kitchen in chopped and sliced bits of vegetables and meat.

And he was so close too!

Sighing, Utakata dismissed his protective bubble before turning off the gas on the stove-top, extinguishing the flame- like he'd learned after nearly burning the residence all of them were staying at into cinders- before moving to clean up the remnants of the basic stew.

Movement behind him made the presence of the man teaching him- Han- known to the kitchen's lone occupant. Student and teacher made eye contact for the briefest of moments before Han lowered his head, turned around and left the kitchen.

Utakata nearly fell down upon that reaction. Usually, Han would calmly- and coldly- say that Utakata had no talent at cooking, and should stop his "pointless pursuits immediately".

And then Utakata would clean up, learn from his mistakes, and try again.

The fact that Han had given up did not speak well of his latest attempt.

Walking up the wall, Utakata barely noticed the change in gravity as he crouched down on the ceiling with rags in hand to clear up the pieces of stew that had reached the ceiling.

 _Maybe I should just ask him to let him lead by example?_ Utakata had tried to get the gentile giant to open up outside of training, but so far it seemed like a pointless endeavor- Han was just too antisocial to open up to anyone outside of his brother.

 _Like I'm any better..._ Utakata was no better- he wasn't antisocial like Han, but he didn't go out of his way to be completely open, as Naruto was.

Which reminded him...

Naruto was way too open and trusting. Too much so for comprehension. Sure, he was secretive enough, but when he had a chance to talk about the stuff he knew, he divulged _everything_. Even things he really shouldn't have told them (because really, did the kid seriously think that all of them would stay together for the rest of their lives?), all because Naruto found them to be nice to him.

That fact spoke volumes of how he grew up in Konoha.

And it scared _all_ of the older ninja. They'd talked with each other when the teens were off by themselves, sharing experiences and knowledge that wouldn't betray their Hidden Village.

Even if they were Missing-nin, it didn't mean that they would just go about selling their village's secrets to the first person who asked.

And the resulting conclusions they reached was nothing short of horrifying.

Fu didn't think of any of them as human, believing that they were a species unto their own.

Gaara had been psychotic for most of his life, and thought himself as a monster, of sorts, until meeting Naruto.

Which brought them to the big problem.

Utakata had noticed many things about the teen's behavior that practically sickened him- the lack of social knowledge, no discernible _life_ outside of his being a ninja- no favorite books, manga, movies, nothing that a normal teen his age would be interested in. But that wasn't the worst of it.

The worst came when Naruto revealed his parentage, and how he never knew of it growing up.

And it was made even more so when he confessed that it wasn't before becoming a ninja almost a year ago that he knew of his status as a Jinchuuriki.

Utakata found that to be the most reprehensible thing that Konoha could ever do- Jinchuuriki needed to be told of their status as soon as possible, lest they become some sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. And they needed to be told in a controlled environment.

Gaara had learned of his status after striking the killing blow upon his uncle- causing him to go mad.

Fu didn't even know of the term Jinchuuriki until they told her.

Naruto...

Utakata sighed.

Naruto hadn't known at all, yet everyone around him knew. That had to be one of the worst kinds of psychological torture ever devised.

Utakata was so lost in his musings that he didn't realize that he'd finished cleaning until he was standing in a spotless kitchen with Han across from him.

When the giant had entered was unknown to the former hunter-nin.

"You know, if you just let me help out during mealtime, I'd learn a lot more than I would if I continued." Utakata said, not bothering to look the man standing across from him. Childish, he knew, but damn if it wasn't effective.

"You will not do anything more than cut what I want you to cut, how I want it cut, and no other way. If you can do that, _then_ I will consider teaching you." The response was not something Utakata expected- the childish act was nothing more than him fulfilling the need to be childish, nothing more.

Pushing the thoughts of Naruto's upbringing aside for later discussion with the others, Utakata silently nodded before leaving the kitchen to check on the blond, who was still recovering from the seal overwriting. He felt his mouth move into a tiny smile.

Sometimes it paid to be childish, even if it didn't get the results you were expecting.

~~***~~

Han surveyed the kitchen after Utakata left, looking for any sign of the lanky man's failure at successfully cooking something. Seeing none, he sighed in relief, shoulders slumping.

_He's getting better..._

And it was true. The Rokubi container was certainly getting better in his skills, if the fact that it wasn't until the stew was nearly done that it went wrong was anything to go by. Han was impressed- if only slightly- at Utakata's improvement.

Though that didn't mean that he wasn't going to go easy of the man for screwing around in _his_ kitchen.

Oh, yes, Utakata would learn not to mess with Han's territory.

Han silently chuckled to himself at his possessiveness, finding it almost odd that he had yet to break that old habit. Even as a young child, he'd always been protective of anything he viewed as _his_.

Usurping that ability when his older sister started dating the son of the Sandaime had brought him all kinds of fun, even Roshi had found it hilarious when the two had gotten married- Kitsuchi had nearly wet himself at the look Han had given the man at their wedding.

Let it not be said that Han had no sense of humor.

Stepping out of the kitchen, Han moved to go walk around the compound, taking in the sights of the gardens run wild. As he walked, the ground seemed to shimmer, an affect of the sun as it passed through the Biju Barrier, which had yet to stop. Yagura had said that so long as the gates were shut, the barrier would remain up, impenetrable and powered by some form of chakra that not even _he_ could figure out.

Stopping at this one garden, it appeared to be rather nicely done, needing only a little weeding for it to grow back into it's former glory.

Glancing around, Han saw that no one was near, and he couldn't sense anyone nearby.

So he got down and went to work, using his hands and basic earth manipulation to start clearing the weeds and loosening the dirt around the flowers. He got into a sort of repetition, soothing and relaxing, yet strengthening at the same time.

Gardening had always been Han's guilty pleasure, loving how you could lose yourself in caring for the plants, ensuring that they would grow big and strong.

He was so into his work that he almost didn't notice when Utakata's chakra signature had approached him. Getting up, he quickly set about dusting off the dirt he'd accumulated on himself.

Though he was too late.

"I didn't know you gardened."

"It... is not something I let others know." Han chose his words carefully, letting Utakata know that it wasn't something he wanted others to know. If Utakata got the message, he didn't show it, only choosing to nod.

"Right." Utakata shifted to look at the garden Han was tending to. "It's a nice set-up you're working on, though and I know just the right herbs and shrubs that would accent this garden nicely."

Had was shocked that Utakata was a gardener. Usually, if you had no talent in the kitchen, then you didn't have the finesse for such delicate work a gardening.

 _How_ Utakata could know so much about gardening and yet cook so crapily Han would never know.

"Perhaps... we can work on it together?" Han wasn't one to ever go into a crowd of people and _socialize_ , of all things, but that didn't mean that he was heartless towards others when conversing with them.

And who knows? Maybe he'll make an honest-to-goodness friend in Utakata.

~~***~~

Gaara studied the seal in front of him intensely, occasionally consulting the scroll explaining the basics of what did what in seals- why certain lines were placed in certain ways, and how altering them radically changed the nature of the seal.

Though he only consulted the scroll when he came across something that he had not seen the scroll mention.

Gaara felt something akin to pride at having an eidetic memory, despite how outlandish such a thing would have seemed to him a year previously.

He'd certainly changed ever since meeting Uzumaki Naruto.

Before, Gaara wouldn't have given anyone else a second thought. He would have either ignored them or, if they were persistent or annoying, he would have killed them.

Now, however...

Gaara found that he would rather get to know people, only killing when in battle.

Or if Naruto condoned it.

Whichever came first.

Gaara knew he was psychotic- how couldn't he. All those years as an insomniac left him with little to do when he wasn't meditating, so he'd read books on everything he could think of that interested him- the different Biju, the previous containers of Shukaku, the Hidden Villages, diplomatic etiquette, the list went on and on. He even spent some time attempting to learn the sealing arts in the hopes of strengthening his seal- sleep had always fascinated Gaara- though without someone to personally explain and teach him, his efforts were fruitless.

But the one thing that really stuck, out of all those things, was when he'd gotten his hands on those psychology books- reading about the inner workings of the human mind was what had allowed him the ability to meditate and achieve a sleep-like trance in the first place.

Though it wasn't like the real thing, Gaara secretly enjoyed the peace and quiet he could get away from Shukaku's ravings each time he meditated. Sure, he had strengthened his mental fortitude to the point that only Shukaku's enraged screaming bothered him, it still kept him from really sleeping.

From dreaming.

Dreams were an odd concept for Gaara- creating entire worlds where the laws of the universe could not apply was not something that he could fully understand, though he desperately wanted to.

The mindscape could comparatively be called a dream, but it wasn't- the surrealism just didn't exist, and it wasn't capable of bending and changing to the person's will.

Closing the teaching scroll, Gaara gathered all his notes together for Yagura to go over- that day's assignment was to read the scroll before studying the basic sealing scroll and noting what each part's role was in the overall seal- including what each piece was capable of.

Gaara would never admit it aloud (why would he? Naruto would notice and voice it anyway) but he was excited about the upcoming training.

If he was able to control Shukaku, then he would be able to sleep.

He would be able to _dream_.

~~***~~

Yagura looked up from his studies of the Uzumaki clan seals to see the organized notes that Gaara laid down on the desk in front of him.

"I have studied and labeled the seal presented to the best of my ability, including notes on how the structure could be improved along with a detailed explanation of the process in initiating the seal." Gaara's no-nonsense tone was riddled with well-hidden anticipation, prompting Yagura to do more than glance over the teen's notes- which were surprisingly informative.

"Impressive. Most beginners wouldn't think to do that." Yagura didn't mention that such foreknowledge was a learned experience, gained after several months- if not years- of studying sealing. He himself had not learned it until half a year into learning them- but he'd be fucked if he said as much to the teen.

There were certain things you just don't divulge to your students, no matter how prodigious they were.

"Thank you." The comment was surprising- Gaara hadn't been one to be grateful before. Perhaps he was changing for the better.

Yagura hid a smile at that, lest the object of his thoughts get the wrong idea, so he simply opted for a curt nod and dismissal for the day. Gaara nodded himself before going to... do whatever it was that he did in his spare time.

_I should really get to know all of them better..._

Sliding back into place, Yagura took one last look at Gaara's notes before altering his planned teaching method for the teen- someone with such a meticulous approach to sealing should be taught right, lest they lose the chance to achieve their potential in the sealing arts.

Teaching method mattered as much as the student's learning ability.

Setting aside the completed work, Yagura delved back into his studies of Uzumaki clan history.

And what he read scared and shocked him to no end.

It told the story of a single man, the very first of the clan, and his eternal legacy.

The man was said to have possessed the very first Dojusu- the Rinnegan. This man, with his eyes, had traveled the world, studying under the best fighters, learning all he could about the world- and his power.

He had strayed away from people's attention, not wanting to be praised as a god, and lived alone for most of his life.

Until the Beast appeared.

The Beast was said to have simply... appeared. Though few lived after it reduced a town to ash- and even then, they'd died from having been exposed the the Beast's presence.

It was a demon, they said, a tailed beast come to remove humanity from existence. A Biju. The Juubi.

The Beast's rampage continued for over a week, and in no time all on the continent and beyond knew of the Beast, and prepared to do what they could to defend against it.

The Samurai rallied together, heading the front. With them were the monks, who were adept at the martial arts, something that would later be known as Taijutsu.

And the man- a sage by the time he entered the battlefield.

Though, his appearance had changed.

His once auburn hair now was the color of freshly spilt blood and seemed to almost move of it's own accord. His skin had darkened to the point that it was almost purple- like he'd died and was decaying. From his head sprouted two short horns.

And he used a special technique- what would later be known as the Dead Demon Consuming seal- to seal the Beast within himself.

From then, he'd been revered for his bravery, and many looked past his physical appearance to see the kind, brave soul within. He was called the Sage of Six Paths.

The Sage had two sons, both strong in their own right- and capable of using the same power he could. On his deathbed, he looked at both of his sons before casting an impossible jutsu, making reality his own to manipulate.

First, he broke the Beast into Nine, each modeled after the different spirits of children's tales.

Then, he gave all the people the ability to use the same powers of the body he could use- which he called chakra.

Finally, he bestowed upon his youngest son his legacy of the mystic Sage powers, much to the ire of his older son.

The Sage, upon his death, was said to have become immortal, in a sense. An actual god, though none could prove it.

His technique, the Dead Demon Consuming seal, was outlawed- all users died.

The younger son had gone on to found his own clan, while the elder displayed his own special power- a Kekkei Genkai, as it would come to be called.

The younger brother's clan became known as the Senju clan.

The elder's as the Uchiha clan.

Soon, the Sage's story became nothing more than legend, and the Uzumaki were all but forgotten. Nearly 200 years later, a faction of Senju would depart from their clan to reestablish the Uzumaki clan, though none of them were able to display the Rinnegan, and the Uzumaki were said to have been derived from the Senju, not the other way around.

Though, there was a legend within both clans that the Sage had said that he was only the first, that in time, a new Sage would appear- this one greater than the first, and would stop the Juubi from returning once more.

Yagura set down the scroll, not moving. Not blinking. Not even breathing.

He'd recognized the description of the Sage, having seen it less than a week ago.

The Sage had died and become the Shinigami.

 _No._ Yagura firmly told himself. If it was at all possible to stop it from coming true, Yagura would do it. He remembered the conversation that he'd had with Namikaze.

***Flashback***

Both combatants were winded, though Minato seemed the worse of the two. He'd sustained several injuries that would be nearly fatal to others- a punctured lung, deep lacerations all over his torso, bleeding heavily, and a defunct left hand, hanging on only by his skin.

Yagura, however, was less off, having only several bruised and cracked bones.

"It seems that you are incapable of sustaining or even fighting on par with an opponent in Taijutsu." Yagura stated. "It really makes me wonder what the standard for Kage is in Konoha, that they let someone as weak as you become their leader."

Minato said nothing.

"You still haven't answered my question." Yagura said quite suddenly, stalling for time. Minato had only a few minutes left, and Yagura wouldn't waste them fighting when he could get the answer he needed.

"I told you, I-"

"That is not what I meant." Yagura stated. "Madara's involvement is not relevant. You sealing Kyuubi into Naruto is."

"I was told of a prophecy once." Minato suddenly said, surprising his opponent. "It said that there would come a child, and this child would rid the world of the need for war. And he would lead it into an era of peace."

"How is that-?"

"My sensei, Jiraiya of the Sannin, was said to have to make a choice." Minato interrupted. "He said that the choice would send the child on either the path to peace, or the path of destruction.

"I believe that Naruto is that child." Minato continued. "And I sealed the Kyuubi into him- half of it, of course, so that he would remain sane- so that he would use it's power to become that child of that prophecy."

"At the cost of your life?" Yagura looked skeptical.

"There was no other way to split the Kyuubi, or ensure that the other half didn't break loose and join into one within Naruto." Minato finished. Yagura calmly looked at the man across from him, before moving to attack. Suddenly, he'd shoved his arm directly through Minato's chest, coating the former Mizukage in the blood of his opponent.

"To do such a thing is reprehensible, no matter the circumstances." Yagura told the dying soul. "I don't believe in things such as fate or prophecies. You are just a foolish coward who couldn't handle your own mistakes and chose the easy way out though death. Die peacefully, knowing that."

Minato's soul broke down, falling apart and onto the man he was impaled on, coating the Mizukage further.

***End Flashback***

Yagura now had proof of the prophecy.

And he would do everything he could to ensure that it would never come to pass.

Resolve set, he set to work preparing all the necessary seals needed for when he would start teaching the others to use their Biju's power.

And he would ensure that the process would become common knowledge when Akatsuki was no longer a threat.

No matter what, that prophecy would never come to pass.

Not it he had anything to say about it.


	18. Serpentine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a timeskip, and then...

The Tenchi Bridge sat in the Southern edge of the Land of Valleys, near the border between it and the Land of Fire. It was not particularly used by many, as the trade routes leading to and from it were long since destroyed in the clashes during the Third Great Shinobi World War.

Which made it the perfect meeting spot for Sasori to contact his sleeper agent.

 _Far from civilization and an ideal spot to dispose of bodies unfit to become art._ Sasori mused as he lumbered over the bridge in the rebuilt Hiruko towards his sleeper agent. Ever since the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki had humiliated him by getting past it's defenses, Sasori had made it top priority to rethink his battle plans.

And rethink he did, for Hiruko was built to operate in close combat as well as deal ranged attacks.

"It has been a long time, Sasori." His contact stood in front of him, hidden by a cloak. His contact removed the hood. "Five years."

"Were you followed?" An idiotic question. Sasori, as a puppeteer, had fantastic chakra sensing, and could clearly feel Orochimaru's presence, impressively hidden, in the foliage behind his underling.

Of course, it wasn't like such a betrayal wasn't planned when he created a sleeper agent out of the man.

"No, it is safe." Ah, a lie. Good. All was according to plan, then. "If we could make this brief, it was quite hard slipping away to do this."

"Of course." Sasori humored the man. "Report."

"We have many bases." The man began. "To keep from being discovered, we change bases on a weekly basis. There are, of course, bases in more than just the Sound." He added, glancing back. "The method of moving changes regularly, and can be cumbersome. Our current base is on a small island in a lake to the North. We move in three days."

The man paused, as if contemplating something, and Sasori was almost amused at the silent tells being sent between the target and spy.

_Charming, yes, but irrelevant._

"Continue, Yakushi Kabuto." Sasori's voice came out of Hiruko deeper and rougher, and did well to lay out the subtle threat to the man's life.

"Well," Kabuto began, before stopping, wary of a sound behind him. A tiny rabbit appeared from the brush. "Just a rabbit..."

 _And so it begins..._ Sasori thought, seeing the signal for what it was.

"Regarding the orders you gave me," Kabuto brought the conversation back to the matter at hand. "After transferring to a new body, Orochimaru destroys his former vessels. I was unable to retrieve cell samples."

"Then what use are you to me?" Sasori questioned, preparing Hiruko's tail to kill the man.

Suddenly, Orochimaru's form appeared behind Kabuto, a snake wrapped around his right-hand man.

"What an interesting conversation." He spoke. "Mind if I join in?"

Sasori struck.

Hiruko's tail was stained in blood, and Kabuto sported a nasty gash on his torso, while Orochimaru was uninjured.

"It seems we aren't so different after all." Orochimaru smirked. "We both treat our subordinates the same."

"I am not like you." Sasori coldly stated, and watched with a hint of satisfaction that Kabuto's wound was not healing, nor would it stop bleeding. Hiruko's tail shifted dangerously in the air above Sasori. "And whoever said that Kabuto was ever supposed to be my subordinate?"

Orochimaru scowled briefly at the sudden knowledge, before smirking once more.

"So Kabuto was just bait, then?" Sasori said nothing, which appeared to amuse Orochimaru, who clapped his hands together and joyously stated. "Then I'll enjoy watching this."

Suddenly Kabuto was close to Sasori, using his Chakra Scalpels to attempt to kill the Akatsuki member. The swing of his arms missed Hiruko completely, instead slicing the Akatsuki cloak in half while passing over the protective puppet harmlessly.

"Recent events have made me reevaluate my fighting style." Sasori said, Hiruko's mouth moving in time with his voice. "This will not be a fight you will walk away from alive."

"Oh?" Orochimaru appeared bemused, until realizing that Kabuto wasn't moving, his right arm still outstretched about Hiruko.

Yes." Sasori said. "For example, witness one of the greater techniques I've kept secret."

Kabuto spun, rushing to attack Orochimaru, who blithely dodged the forward attack, nearly missing Hiruko raise it's left arm and point the hand towards him.

"How quaint." Orochimaru said, his ever-present smirk back on his face. "It's been a while since I've seen you use that."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Sasori said, launching a single once of the wooden missiles towards the snake Sannin. "This is not like anything you've ever seen."

Kabuto was yanked back, and the expression on his face showed that the movement was not the one he wanted to make. Orochimaru jumped back, allowing the projectile to fly aimlessly-

**BOOM!**

The wooden missile exploded, the fireball engulfing the center of the Tenchi Bridge- Orochimaru included.

Through the smoke, the sound of the bridge collapsing could be heard as Sasori- with his unwilling prisoner in tow- fled to the one side of the bridge.

Huge pillars of wood sprang out of the cliff face, slamming into the bridge and stopping the further destruction.

_So they come in..._

Sasori was an accomplished sensor-nin, and as such none could hide from him.

Not even the pair of ninja who'd been tailing him ever since he'd entered the Land of Fire. Konoha ANBU, he was sure.

Stopping at the end of the bridge, Sasori prepared for combat, getting a feel for Kabuto's body.

"What are you going to do to me?" Kabuto ground out towards Sasori. Hiruko's head didn't move- why would it? Sasori didn't need it to see his living puppet.

"I'm going to take you back to Leader." Sasori replied. "I'm sure he'd love to know all the secrets stored within your head. However, before I can do that, I'm going to use you against your master."

Kabuto's Chakra Scalpels extended until they were almost the length that Kabuto was tall, and crossed the man's arms while moving him into a defensive posture- blocking the area-wide Wind Jutsu that cleared the dust.

Standing at the other end of the ruined bridge, half his body sloughing off of him into a red-pink puddle on the ground, was Orochimaru.

"Impressive!" He called out, before gagging.

From his mouth sprang... himself. Completely unharmed.

"But it'll take much more than that if you wish to kill me!"

And then the ANBU struck.

From the ground tendrils grew, winding their way around Orochimaru, while Kabuto's body went limp.

The first was quite tall, sporting short, spiky brown hair and a feline mask, while the other had long strawberry blond hair done up in a top-knot and wore an avian mask.

The cat-masked one stood facing Orochimaru, while the falcon-masked one faced Sasori.

"I was not aware that there were any Wood Release users in Konoha." Sasori stated, while Orochimaru looked positively gleeful.

"How wonderful! I didn't know that any of those subjects lived." Orochimaru slid out of the cage of wood before disappearing. "I think I'll keep you. It will be so _very_ fascinating to know how you survived." He reappeared in front of Cat, who was bound with a snake and bitten.

Cat turned into a wooden dummy.

"Quaint, but not surprising." Orochimaru said, before moving to avoid the Wood Release trees that sprouted from his position a microsecond later.

~~***~~

On Sasori's end, he had a much easier time storing Kabuto's unconscious body away, and prepared to attack the Yamanaka across from him.

"I don't believe I have any Yamanaka in my collection." Sasori mused. "But I think, if you can impress me enough, you'll have the privilege of becoming my art."

Falcon said nothing, instead opting to attempt to take over Sasori's mind, which failed. As Falcon's body slumped over, Sasori repressed a sigh.

"So this is what Konoha's best has been reduced to- using obvious techniques in the hopes that they'll work?" Hiruko's tail prepared to end the ANBU's life before Kabuto rent it to pieces using his Chakra Scalpels.

"Whoever said I was aiming at you?" Kabuto's voice was cold, yet there was an undertone of smugness that briefly irked Sasori.

"Of course, whoever said that a puppeteer's instrument's can ever be destroyed?" Sasori replied, as the segmented pieces of Hiruko's tail rose into the air and flew towards the Yamanaka's body, but were blocked by Falcon, who had left Kabuto's body to move to safety.

His retreat was stopped by a hail of Senbon, which came from Hiruko's mouth.

"Poisoning me is pointless, if you want information." Falcon said, removing the needles that had hit him and were covered in a purple liquid.

"Which is precisely why all those Senbon where coated in a heavy sedative." Sasori said, watching on as Falcon's body dropped to the ground. Using chakra strings, he made both Falcon and Kabuto move into the forest, where they would be safe from harm.

For good measure, he hit Kabuto with a volley of sedatives to ensure the man would remain down long enough to get to Leader.

_Now to get the Wood user..._

Sasori looked over at Orochimaru, who stood over the downed ANBU with a triumphant smile on his face.

It was a simple matter of animating the man and sending him towards Sasori, to get the snake Sannin's attention.

"Our battle is not over." Sasori intoned, and from Hiruko's mouth spat a trio of scrolls, which exploded in a huge veil of smoke.

_And now the hard part..._

"Attacking with all of your puppets, Sasori?" Orochimaru's tone was one of an elder scolding a child. "I though you had changed your tactics."

"I did." The smoke cleared, revealing twenty puppets, all clad in black cloaks and exceedingly humanoid. "This formation is all I need to kill you."

"Oh?" The Sannin did not look impressed. "Then perhaps I should reintroduce you to my Summons."

He sliced his hand and swiped it across the tattoo of a serpent before slamming both hands on the ground. "Destroy them."

From the resulting smoke sprang dozens of snakes, all as large as the average man.

And all cut down by one of the puppets, sporting a large cleaver-like swords as a hand.

As the headless snakes fell to the ground- their bond to their Summoner broken- they disappeared into smoke, which was used to hide the lunge from a giant snake, larger than the previous combined.

This time, a second puppet took front, a tiny woman.

Her mouth opened and exuded a dark haze, which engulfed and ate up the giant summons in seconds- only gelatinous bones returning to the Summons world.

Orochimaru appeared unhappy, which was enough to almost make Sasori happy- if he weren't in the midst of a battle.

"Well?" Sasori couldn't help the smug tone in his voice- watching as he enraged Orochimaru further.

"It's been quite some time since I've had to use this." Orochimaru said, before a snake emerged out of his mouth, and from it came a simple, yet legendary, daito- the Kusanagi. "None have faced this blade and lived to tell the tale."

"We shall see." Sasori said, setting up a defensive maneuver- it wouldn't do to have his entire plan become destroyed simply by underestimating the sword that could cut through almost anything.

_Good thing I've created a counter to it..._

Orochimaru struck, the Kusanagi blade extended, slicing through the air towards Sasori. He followed a well-known rule when dealing with puppeteers: kill the puppeteer and the puppets become harmless.

However, Hiruko extended his right arm, which looked quite normal- until the skin parted and the forearm spread open and created a chakra shield.

The Kusanagi blade broke the shield, but passed no further.

Suddenly, the blade retracted, pulling Orochimaru in close.

Close enough to send a volley of snakes with enough force to destroy Hiruko beyond repair.

That is, if they hadn't been crushed by a third puppet- a tall brutish man, who'd used his fists to crush the skulls of the snakes into messy stains on the ground.

"I am not amused, Sasori." Orochimaru's voice came from behind the man, and that was all the warning he had before Hiruko was halved.

The entire armored puppet collapsed in on itself before being crushed into the ground by a powerful Wind Release: Vacuum Great Sphere.

"Nor I, Orochimaru." Sasori's voice came from the edge of the bridge overlooking the ravine, and the Sannin showed outright surprise at the puppeteer's real body.

"How?" The man snarled, rage filling his eyes. " _I_ cultivated that jutsu. _I_ perfected it! How dare you steal _my_ technique!"

He leapt at the young-looking red-head, who simply shifted his fingers, sending all his puppets into position around him, the tall one taking point, with the tiny woman standing behind him. All around Sasori were the remaining puppets.

Blood came out of Orochimaru's mouth as he was bent double over the arm of the brutish puppet.

And with the blood was an unharmed Orochimaru, who sliced through the brutish man-puppet's head with an almost lazy swipe of Kusanagi, before he was engulfed in the dark green-yellow haze of the mousy woman-puppet.

"I'd like to see you survive that." Sasori coldly stated before the Sannin in the haze broke apart, becoming nothing but mud.

"I already did." The Sannin's voice came from behind, and Sasori shifted, already anticipating the attack- though there was none. "I do admit, however, that your style has drastically changed since I last saw it. Perhaps I'll be able to glean more of your secrets after I kill you, I wonder."

"I doubt that." Sasori's said, and raised his hands together, making two puppets- the one with the sword-hand and another swordsman- converge onto the Sannin's position, who lazily blocked and sliced through them.

"Again, Sasori?" He questioned. "Don't think that I haven't figured out your battle plan."

"Then you know what comes next." Sasori said, dropping his hands and cutting ties with both puppets.

**BA-BOOM!**

The fireball engulfed the Sannin completely, and even was powerful enough to send Sasori skidding back. The remains of the Tenchi Bridge were rent to dust as it was caught up in the explosion.

As the dust and smoke settled, Sasori stayed on edge- he knew Orochimaru well enough to know that not even _that_ would work to effectively take out the snake Sannin. Frankly, he'd created it as a last resort, and disliked having to waste two pieces of his art on such a vulgar act.

Oh, how one must suffer for their art to shine.

Of course, doing so _does_ have it's perks, as there was no sign that Orochimaru had even been there.

"Either you are dead, or pretending to be." Sasori said to the air. "Though I am-" He was cut off when one of his puppets was destroyed. He sighed in annoyance. "I hope you understand how hard it was to turn that person into one of my art pieces."

"Why do you think I broke your little toy?" The snake Sannin stood amongst the remains of Sasori's puppet- a Kumo jonin, by the looks of it. "And I'll break the rest of them before coming after you."

"You are still the arrogant psycho I remember Orochimaru." Sasori sighed. "And I'd hoped to have taken you down before resorting to doing this."

"Oh?" The Sannin was curious, but wary. "Were you now?"

"Yes, but I realize now I have no choice." Sasori raised his arm in the air, and balled his hand into a fist. "Goodbye."

A puppet arm came shooting down, pulling him- and through his chakra strings, his remaining puppets and captors- up high in the air, towards a bird circling in the air.

"That was some art you made, mmm!" Deidara told Sasori once he landed on the giant sentry bird with his captors. "I'm impressed you didn't bring it _all_ out, though. What, didn't want to lose your toys?"

"Shut up. I failed. You're up." Sasori didn't even look at Deidara, who grinned before taking a handful of clay and stuffing it into his real mouth, chewing and prepping it for his personal masterstroke.

C4.

Suddenly he bent over, seeming to throw up, but in reality was ejecting a huge effigy of himself made of clay.

"Let's see him live after _this_!" Deidara triumphantly crowed, and Sasori seemed to sulk as he resealed his remaining 16 puppets, bound his captives and treated Kabuto's wound with his special antidote. He'd created that poison with an anticoagulant, so that it would hinder the man's regenerative powers as much as possible.

It would also do nicely when he next came into contact with the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki.

"Shut up and do it already." Sasori snapped, and Deidara simply shrugged.

"We'll be out of range in a sec." Deidara let the clay bird soar for several seconds more before looking at the giant him standing on the edge of the ravine- most likely leering at a stunned Orochimaru. "Katsu!"

The giant Deidara imploded.

Deidara watched as entire flocks of birds disintegrated before his eyes, and continued watching for almost a minute more before turning to Sasori in triumph.

"He's dead." Sasori blandly stared at his partner.

"You watched him die?" Deidara nodded. "And it wasn't a clone?" A shake of the head this time. "I highly doubt you'll be able to tell."

"I can so!" Deidara pointed to the apparatus over his left eye, bringing to mind it's telescopic capabilities as well as the ability to see past genjutsu, with a giant grin. "I watched him die, bit by bit. Guy tried to shed his skin, but it didn't work. That bastard's dead."

~~***~~

At the epicenter of the implosion, the only signs of there having been a battle the ruined bridge and remnants of Sasori's puppets. Suddenly, the ground cracked and shifted upwards, creating a mound reminiscent of an anthill, before a pale arm burst forth from the top, pulling a body up and out.

Orochimaru climbed out of the mound, holding his injured side.

He'd barely been able to survive that attack, and doubted that he would, either.

He needed to get back to the base and take over Sasuke's body before this one died.

Orochimaru smiled.

Oh, yes. He'd get the last laugh on Akatsuki when their plan failed, and he was there to crush them with the might of the Sharingan.

He'd even be strong enough to eliminate that bastard Madara- and Itachi.

He'd become immortal, and reign supreme over the Shinobi world as it's strongest creation.


	19. The World At Large

"Finish up." Kakuzu grumbled. "Leader's expecting us."

"I don't like this part any more than you, but Jashin commands it be done." Hidan yelled back, laying on the ground amidst the rubble that used to be one of Kumo's war supply buildings. All around them, the destruction was clear- and probably heard for miles around, Kakuzu grudgingly thought.

Their target- well, Hidan's assigned target, really, was pinned to one of the few walls still standing, her hands run through by one of Hidan's spikes- which held her aloft. She stood of an average height, and could be quickly found in all of Kumo- her skin was tanned, but still pale compared to the dark-skinned populous that made up the majority of Kumogakure. Her face held slanted eyes that were usually framed by the few stray strands of dirty-blond hair that escaped her braid- hair that now lay haphazardly over her head, and provided a perverse picturesque symmetry to the blood-stained clothes.

27-year-old Nii Yugito, if anyone saw her now, would be considered a martyr instead of the helpless victim.

"I don't care." Kakuzu blandly said, earning the ire of his partner. "This is the first Jinchuuriki we've been able to locate in two years- Leader doesn't want to take any chances that this one disappear like the others. He's going to meet up with us personally near the spot to ensure nothing happens, if you remember."

And _nothing_ would happen, Kakuzu thought irritably. Ever since he had failed to capture the Gobi, it was like some sort of curse had descended upon Akatsuki. Zetsu had failed to capture the Nanabi- which was later seen by Deidara when he attempted to capture the Rokubi a fortnight later, along with what they'd learned were the Yonbi and Ichibi Jinchuuriki. The fact that both of them were seen with the Kyuubi and Gobi meant something quite unsettling.

The Jinchuuriki were banding together.

Of course, they'd simply chosen to alter their plans by first having Zetsu locate and spy on them before sending in a diversion to split them up- easy pickings to take them down if they didn't have to rely on each other instead of going at the Akatsuki with everything they got.

But then all of them dropped off the map.

It didn't help any that the Sanbi Jinchuuriki was rumored to have died releasing it's Biju- though Leader told them that the Sanbi Jinchuuriki was alive. The Yondaime Mizukage was rumored to have complete control over his Biju, after all, despite all evidence showing that such a thing was almost impossible. Only Uchiha Madara and the Shodai Hokage had to power to control the Biju.

And then there was the problem that the Godaime Kazekage had somehow gotten wind of their goals and spread word of it to the _entire_ Elemental Nations. Which meant that Kakuzu had to lay low- and avoid taking down the ninja with big bounties on their heads, something that angered the immortal man to no end.

The fact that the others had to lay low too was little recompense.

That was two years ago.

Which was why Kakuzu didn't want anything to go wrong with capturing the Nibi. He'd been trusted with taking in the Nibi, and didn't want anything happening to change that. _Anything_.

Kakuzu was fully prepared to go all out on anyone and anything that dared to stop the extraction.

~~***~~

Utakata stood with Gaara, overlooking the ruins of the Kumo supply building, watching the two Akatsuki members- one squatting down on a chunk of building while another lay on the ground within an odd marking- a triangle within a circle. The second one also was impaled upon something.

_A retractable pike..._

Utakata knew about those, having worked with one himself.

Suddenly, the one on the pike- whom Utakata had presumed had died, and his partner was resting before destroying the body- pulled the pike from his body and stood up, stretching to reduce the chance of sore muscles later. And then the other one stood too, before walking towards the remains of a wall across from them and briefly disappearing from sight for several seconds before returning into sight- with the bloodied form of a woman.

"She must be like us." Gaara murmured beside him, the teen's black sand audibly vibrating with anticipation.

"Given the Yokai that drew us here, yeah." Utakata agreed, rolling his eyes at the obvious statement. "So we save her?" Utakata had long since learned never to argue with Gaara when he got into one of his moods- While the Ichibi Jinchuuriki had mellowed out some, he was still the psychotic that killed someone for even looking at him oddly.

Something that Utakata was glad he'd grown out of.

"Obviously." Gaara's tone was slow, like he was explaining something to a toddler. "We are duty-bound to help her, and I have unfinished business with the silver-haired one." He added darkly.

"Okay~." Utakata had also learned not to question Gaara when he was in one of his moods. "I'll take on the masked guy, get the girl, and you fend off the other guy while protecting her. Sound good?"

Gaara stared at Utakata, who resisted the insane urge to shift or give any telling sign of weakness under the teen's piercing stare.

"Yes."

~~***~~

Hidan wasn't entirely sure how they'd gotten into this position.

 _Again_.

Nearest he could tell, he and Kakuzu were leaving the ruins and heading towards base- and arguing over who carried the target- when they'd been besieged by these two people, one of whom he recognized immediately.

"I've come to kill you." His opponent said, taking a basic guard stance while the black gourd on his back broke apart and canvassed the area. Hidan just smirked and held up his tri-bladed scythe.

"That's my line, infidel." Hidan growled, activating one of the more complex curse jutsu taught to those under the order of Jashin. It was simple in idea, but complex in development. The idea was that the basic blood-curse could be altered so that the blood wasn't needed to activate it- only sight and knowledge of who their opponent was. "Besides." He added. "You're already dead."

Gaara didn't even so much as quirk an eyebrow at that statement, only choosing to watch as, from Hidan's feet, blood oozed, flowing in a specific set of lines and curves, until it passed underneath him and stopped short of the unconscious woman Gaara was charged with protecting, becoming encircled by a larger ring of blood. Lazily turning his head back to his opponent, Gaara was given sight to Hidan, who stabbed his scythe into the ground and chose only to fight with those retractable pikes of his.

"You aren't using your scythe?" Gaara's voice sounded intrigued, but wary- as it should be, Hidan thought.

_None have escaped this alive..._

Both of them stood still, waiting for their opponent's stance to shift.

And then they _moved_.

~~***~~

Utakata shifted, dodging the jet of water that carved it's way through the mountainside, only to have to jump in the air to avoid Kakuzu's arm shooting at him, the skin darkened considerably- a trademark sign of the Earth Spear- and watch as it took root in the rock behind him.

"And here I was expecting a challenge." Kakuzu's voice came directly behind Utakata, and he barely had time to turn around before he was hit with a concentrated burst of lightning and exploded in a yellow-green haze, showing the modified water clone for what it was- and melting it's way through those black threads that Kakuzu seemed made of.

"That enough of a challenge?" Utakata's voice came from around Kakuzu, who watched on as the acid ate through the black threads and rent his arm from the rest of his body. Without a heart connected to it, he'd have to manually get it back instead of having it come back to him.

Kakuzu seemed to just stand there before all Hell broke loose when his Akatsuki cloak was rent to nothing as all of his masks sent out all their attacks- a fireball, torrent of wind, jet of water and burst of lightning struck all the Utakata's before the man they sprang from jumped in the air. All at once, the attacks stopped and the masks shifted back into place as Kakuzu moved to get his arm back.

And then Utakata- the _real_ Utakata, it seemed- appeared in front of him, holding up a specially made Kunai with the blade almost a meter in length. Utakata had given up wearing the kimono, instead opting to wear something similar to Iwa Chunin and Jonin- the basic Shinobi pants and the single-sleeved shirt.

"So _that's_ where your hearts lie." Utakata stated, looking all too much like the kid in a candy store. "Guess that tells me how many times I gotta kill you."

Kakuzu snorted, his entire mask shifting as his nose seemed to crinkle in disgust. Looking Utakata directly in the eye, he seemed to gauge his options before considering the best one.

"How did you figure it out?" Kakuzu drawled, looking down at his stump of an arm as the black threads seemed to increase in number, bursting from the stump and writhing madly as they twisted together until they resembled as claw-like arm, which he flexed experimentally. "Usually it isn't until someone kills me once that they learn about all of them." Kakuzu chuckled darkly, before turning his head towards the Rokubi container. "And I won't let that happen again."

Kakuzu shot up, black writhing wings exploding out of his back as he soared above his opponent, who watched the entire ordeal with raising interest. With the wings came countless more of those threads, which seemed to form together to create and avian likeness, with talons holding onto Kakuzu, who it dropped down next to his arm before turning back towards Utakata.

It had no head, instead having a mask of what seemed to be a raptor.

The mask opened it's mouth, which sparked a memory within Utakata as the piercing screech made itself known.

Taking a deep breath while forming several hand-seals, Utakata then appeared to _vomit_ an unholy amount of water into the mountainside where the mask-bird was flying over.

And into Kakuzu.

The jet seemed uncontrolled until it suddenly stopped, revealing that the avian-thing had smashed backwards into it's creator- and protected him from harm. Kakuzu hopped atop the bird as it took flight, looking amongst the rubble for his opponent, anger clear upon his face.

And then the bird- and Kakuzu- were sliced in half by a concentrated jet of water. The broken mask of the bird fell to the ground with the remnants of the black threads, which melted down into a thick, goopy black substance before getting absorbed into the ground.

Kakuzu's two halves, meanwhile, were pulled together as a large amount of the black threads yanked them together.

What hit the ground did not look human.

He had the upper and lower face of what was obviously the man Kakuzu once had been, and he had the forearms and feet to prove that he was once human, but what connected them was anything but. A writhing misshapen form, having both five heads and no head, three of them bone-white masks in the shapes of a yellow bull, a red tiger, and a light blue frog, before settling on a single form.

Kakuzu was haunched over, on his hands and feet, and at the base of what was a stocky mass of black threads was Kakuzu's visage, while all around it sprang elongated necks holding each of the masks, which seemed to move of their own volition before setting their sights on the figure of Utakata appearing up out of the gravel that now covered the mountainside.

" _What_ are you?" The man in question inquired, looking aghast at Kakuzu, who seemed to _smirk_ in response.

Or at least Utakata _hoped_ it was something that showed that the _thing_ in front of him had some sort of intelligence.

~~***~~

Gaara blocked a kick to his torso, barely feeling the pain as he grabbed the offending limb and used it to launch it's owner away from him in a spectacular hammer throw that Naruto would've been proud of. Hidan stuck out his arm, stabbing the pike into the ground to slow his acceleration enough to get a grip on the ground. Skidding away from his opponent, Hidan had yet to make any lasting marks on Gaara, but held firm in his belief that he would win in the end.

Gaara, for all his worth, was immensely grateful that he'd been able to increase the speed of creating his armor so that it was nigh impossible to spot. The many injuries that he'd garnered had almost made him collapse had he not been able to hide them and use the pain to fuel his attacks.

Whatever jutsu Hidan had cast, it was pressing the advantage over Gaara.

Coughing slightly, Gaara ignored the wet stickiness that invaded his mouth and tasted like metal- he had to, if he wanted to remain sane.

If he wanted to remain in power.

_But wait..._

Gaara's thinking brought him to an interesting crossroads- to stay sane meant keeping all of his power in check, which made him weak.

Yet, to defeat a member of Akatsuki, he would have to remove all barriers keeping his power locked up. Meaning that he would have to become temporarily insane.

As he watched Hidan's acceleration away from him slow, Gaara made up his mind.

He would lose it in order to win.

He had to.

~~***~~

Utakata watched the man-thing that was Kakuzu from afar, keeping on the move. Each of those masks were capable of a different Element- except for earth, which presumably was what Kakuzu's face served as the avatar of.

4 total.

Utakata passed by one of his clones- a simple water clone, as his poison and acid supplies were running low, and to use up the last of them so needlessly was a waste of good supplies. He'd had to resort to creating the clones with the water in the air- something he'd only been able to do by drawing on a little of the Rokubi's Yokai- simply to distract all five avatars so he could come up with a plan.

There were five hearts total, including Kakuzu's own.

The bird mask was destroyed, and took with it the Wind Element heart.

That meant that if a mask was destroyed, then the heart was too.

Now he had a plan of attack.

Sending his water clones out, they went on the offensive, drawing the fire- and attention- of all three masks, allowing Utakata to slip in close.

_Now for chakra scalpels and..._

Kakuzu's eyes turned towards him.

All of a sudden, the three pillars broke off from the main man-thing, which now resembled something remotely human while the others took on stances- and the images- of the creatures their masks represented.

A tiger. Standing to Kakuzu's right, it reached the man's shoulder in height, and seemed to harbor great power, if the density of the black threads were any indication.

A bull. Directly behind Kakuzu, on two legs, stood a bull, which was imposing in towering over it's creator. The empty black eyes seeming to start right at Utakata.

A frog. If Utakata hadn't seen it, he would've thought that it was just some kind of quadrupedal creature, but there it stooped, haunched over to Kakuzu's left.

The frog and bull opened their mouths.

There was a sound of thunder.

Utakata drew upon the Rokubi's Yokai, going directly into Version 2 of the cloak.

All over him, his skin disappeared, replaced with a formless being crimson-black in color, with six imposing tails resting behind it. It gave off a menacing aura, seeming to turn the air into a solid. There was nothing left to suggest that the shapeless _thing_ laying there had once been one of Kiri's top hunter-nin.

And then it was hit with the attack, and exploded. The menacing aura vanished as the combination attack hit, and if Kakuzu were any less of the man he was, he would have died from the sudden decompression.

"How weak." Kakuzu said, almost seeming pleased with the conclusion of events.

" **Precisely.** " The voice came from behind Kakuzu, and out of the bull-masked creature came the miniature Rokubi, using it's tails to rend the bull into nothing, simply standing there as the remains of the mask fell all around it, and the black threads dissolved into the black goop and slid down and off of it's red-black skin, visible only to the most trained of eyes. As it appeared in Kakuzu's vision, so too did the oppressing aura. " **Now die.** "

To both sides of him, the tiger and frog were rent to bits by exact copies of the miniature Rokubi, and all of them were facing him, and gathering chakra in front of them, which condensed into a tiny ball of swirling black Yokai.

"Shit."

They fired.

~~***~~

Gaara was about to let loose when he felt the rise in Yokai in the air, and stopped his preparation, turning towards the nearby mountains to watch, acknowledging that his opponent did the same.

There was a flash of light, and the Yokai disappeared briefly. Gaara almost had to keep himself from falling over at the sudden decrease in air pressure, watching on impassively as his opponent turned back towards him.

And then the Yokai returned.

And with it came a blast that removed the mountain from existence.

"What the..." Hidan stopped at simply looked on at the blinding flash, seeing spots dance around his eyes before they vanished, leaving only the negatives to dance across his vision each time he blinked. "What what that?"

"That was your partner's death." Gaara answered, his black sand returning into it's gourd shape as he moved to stand back beside his charge- the injured Jinchuuriki. "It is quite irritating really. We were told not to do anything that might bring attention to ourselves. I doubt that a mountain no longer existing can be overlooked."

"Fuck you." Hidan growled, raising his black pike and pulling out a second one, which unfolded in one swift movement. "I'll still kill you. Jashin will _love_ your death." He stepped forward, raising both pikes so that they were directed at Gaara before darting forth.

Only to be blocked by a wall of blood-red water, which cut through the entire valley like a massive dam.

Watching the frothing waters, Gaara didn't even so much as acknowledge the appearance of a six-foot tall crimson-black Rokubi mere feet behind him.

"That was overkill, don't you think?" Gaara questioned, not turning his head- movement hurt too badly for him to do anything more than have his sand armor keep him standing.

" **I don't think so.** " The mini Rokubi answered, shuffling to stand next to Gaara and watch as Hidan glared angrily at the water wall, holding the remains of both pikes in his hands, the ends burnt and smoking. " **The guy had five hearts, and he was too powerful for me** _ **not**_ **to use Version 2.** "

"And the mountain?" The mini Rokubi somehow was able to look abashed, of all things- not that Gaara could see it.

" **Like I said, the guy had five hearts. Would've drawn more attention had I used anything other than the Biju Ball.** " Gaara didn't answer, opting to keep watching his opponent- who he _would_ kill, toss both pikes into the red wall of acid to be eaten up before retrieving his scythe and reattaching it to his body.

"That doesn't explain why you interrupted my fight." Gaara said, looking down at the ground to watch the fading seal marks criss-crossing the valley floor. He found them vastly interesting- curse seals were a type of sealing that were relatively unknown in to many sealing masters, and Yagura said that they were barely understood by even the Uzumaki. The mini Rokubi shrugged- or seemed to shift it's body and tiny arms in a motion indicative of shrugging.

" **You're injured.** " It blankly said, it's head turning to look at Gaara. " **It wouldn't do to have to drag your ass back to camp along with hers.** " It motioned over to the bleeding woman, who was laying on the ground several yards away. One of it's tails shot out, stopping above the woman before dropping down slowly, engulfing her in the healing properties inherent in the Rokubi's Yokai- but were usually overwhelmed by the acidic nature.

"That is a fair point." Gaara conceded, and suddenly he found himself absorbed in one of the tails, his armor breaking away as it encountered the 'skin', revealing the many gashes and lacerations that made up his body. Not moving, Gaara realized that he didn't feel any more pain, and noticed that his wounds were healing at an exponentially fast rate. Within minutes, he was healed and set on the ground, looking as though he hadn't gone toe-to-toe with an S- Class Shinobi. "Thank you."

Reaching out, the mini Rokubi outstretched it's tiny arms before plunging them into the red wall. There was a wet slurping sound as the entire acid wall was sucked into the mini Rokubi, leaving only an impossibly smooth 6-inch dip in the ground dividing the valley floor where the wall had been.

" **Don't** mention it." Utakata replied, dropping out of the Version 2 cloak with a perfectly healed woman in his arms. "Now let's head back to camp. I'm sure Fu will love having another woman around to have girl talk with."

Gaara didn't say anything as he picked up his fallen gourd and adjusting the scarf-strap before joining Utakata and heading to Northeast, toward the Land of Iron. He continued his silence, letting Utakata sweat it out until he deigned to give an answer.

" _Don't_ do that again."

The sudden break in silence nearly causes Utakata to trip, and Gaara smirks to himself as they continue into the tree-line north, towards the distant snow-capped mountains of the Land of Iron.

 _Perhaps there_ is _something in acting immature..._

 

~~***~~

In Konoha, the sun shone brightly, making all it cast it's eternal gaze upon appear paler in color, even the darkest of colors. A pall hung in the air, and while nothing important seemed to have changed, all the residents could feel it- and it put them on edge. The ninja became tense, and there were countless times when veteran Jonin and Chunin nearly attacked each other and civilians. The civilians, for their part, were much more cautious- something that can put the entire Konoha Shinobi force on edge was certainly cause for discomfort. The streets were almost empty, and that in itself wasn't cause for alarm if it wasn't the mid-morning in the market district- and few, if any, souls could be found outside of the merchants.

One Sarutobi Konohamaru and his fellow Genin Moegi and Udon, along with their Jonin-Sensei Ebisu, however, were of the select few souls within the market. Dressed for the coming winter, a chill ran through the air, causing the trio of fresh Genin to bunch their coats closer to their bodies in a feeble attempt to stave off the cold.

"I still don't see why we have to do this." Konohamaru grumbled, shuffling forward to help one of the merchants- a farmer, by the looks of it- unload his stock of vegetables and set them on and around his wooden stand. Next to him, Moegi set down her crate of wheat before turning towards him, her face clearly showing annoyance at having to explain. _Again._

"Because," She started, hands crossed over her chest, though in a more constricting manner than usually expected of sheer annoyance. "It's good practice for when we take higher ranked missions."

"Not to mention good for the economy." Udon chimed in, already back at the caravan hefting up a pair of crates of corn- which Ebisu had to step in as they shifted and threatened to topple themselves and the 12-year-old over. "Besides, it's better than sneaking around the hospital and the Hokage's Office in the hopes of being able to visit Naruto."

At the mention of the mysterious blond, Konohamaru's face darkened considerably, nearly running into Udon as they passed over each other. Moegi, for her part, looked disquieted at the reminder. It had been over two years since the energetic blond had disappeared, and when the trio had gone to their then-academy teacher Iruka, he'd only dodged their questioning, saying that they needed to talk to the Hokage.

Tsunade, for her part, had looked just as distraught as Moegi when telling them that Naruto's last mission- the failed retrieval of Uchiha Sasuke- had left him mentally unstable. When questioned (pestered, more like), she'd revealed that he'd been put under an immensely complex Genjutsu, the effects of it having turned the blond's personality into a bloodthirsty, almost mindless thing. "It's better that you not see him like this." she had said. "He wouldn't want you to."

Of course, it wasn't like they had stopped- Konohamaru was almost banned from setting foot within the Hokage Tower, and would have been, too, if it weren't for his burgeoning ninja career. As it was, the ANBU were under orders to tail him every time he entered the Hokage Tower, and were to foil all attempts to make contact with the Godaime unless he was escorted by his Jonin-Sensei- who was to give a signal to the tail that it was official business (which was enacted when he'd had one of his friends use the Transformation to fake being Ebisu, something that would have worked, had the ANBU given the task not been Sensors).

"I know." Konohamaru's voice cut through the air, bringing everyone's thoughts back to the task at hand. He fixed his two friends with a smile, and picked up the last crate- full of eggplant- before continuing. "But that still doesn't mean I like it."

His words worked to relieve the group of the underlying tension, and they were able to finish unloading and setting up the stands in almost no time.

And yet, despite having moved away from the topic, Naruto remained the subject of Konohamaru's thoughts.

 _I_ will _see you become Hokage, Boss..._

~~***~~

Sitting in the Hokage Tower, Godaime Hokage Senju Tsunade was sitting at her desk looking over the few pieces of paper laid in front of her- ever since Naruto's open banishment (and disappearance), the amount of paperwork she had to go through had slowly diminished to the point where it was a rare occurrence for incoming Chunin and Jonin to see their Kage hard at work. Mission turnover had remained steady in a world that was on edge- ever since word had spread out concerning the intentions of Akatsuki, all the major Hidden Villages had gone into a frenzy to ensure that their Jinchuuriki were safely accounted for.

And that's where it all went to Hell.

Reports had come in that Suna's Jinchuuriki had disappeared, and the sighting of a figure wearing a black cloak dotted with red clouds had sparked the proverbial wildfire. Iwa reported that both of their Jinchuuriki had vanished, the only evidence being that the Yonbi container was last seen chasing after two figures adorned in Akatsuki robes- and when the trail was followed, the remains of a battleground was where it stopped in the Land of Marsh.

Almost a week later, Takigakure gave notice of the disappearance of their Jinchuuriki. This was followed with notice of the presence of Akatsuki in the area. Nothing was found to indicate there was a battle of any kind.

Then, over two weeks later, the Sanbi- which was sealed within the Yondaime Mizukage- was rumored to have been freed when the Rokubi Jinchuuriki, who was on the Mizukage's guard, attempted to defect. Later that day, the port city that bore witness to the Sanbi also bore witness to a series of explosions that emanated from a member of Akatsuki- an Iwa missing-nin by the name of Deidara, who was seen fighting the Rokubi Jinchuuriki out into the open ocean. Minutes later, a massive explosion, so powerful it lit up the night sky into false daylight for several seconds, occurred off town- thankfully far enough away that there were no casualties, but close enough to make the air stiflingly hot for several moments.

And then there was nothing.

Kumo indicated that both of its' Jinchuuriki were accounted for, and were kept under strict guard for 18 straight months before they were cleared to for missions again. The last word on that was both were quite capable of taking down an S-Class missing-nin, and were instructed to avoid capture at all costs.

That was six months ago.

Tsunade sighed as she looked over the report that Jiraiya had given her on the two missing ANBU that had been sent to investigate the claim that an Akatsuki member had been seen traveling through the Land of Fire. It seemed that the person they were tailing had come into contact with Orochimaru- the remains of his Snake-skin jutsu were a dead giveaway. A through search of the area, however, did not yield any results of either the Akatsuki member, Orochimaru, one of his hideouts, or the two ANBU. Another odd thing of note was that the surrounding area showed no signs of life. There were physical things that proved that animals occupied the area- nests and burrows- but no sign of the wildlife that inhabited them.

It was presumed that either Orochimaru or the Akatsuki member- who appeared to use puppets, if the remains of several at the ruins of the Tenchi Bridge were any indication- had taken the two ANBU captive.

Tsunade sighed, having the unpleasant job of informing the Yamanaka clan that Yamanaka Fu was MIA, presumed KIA.

The loss of Tenzo, however, was quite crippling if Akatsuki had gotten hold of him. The Wood Release user, though not on the level of her grandfather, was possibly capable of quelling a Biju. To think that Akatsuki now had this power was nothing short of horrifying. She didn't even want to consider the possibility of Orochimaru having Tenzo- and control over the Biju.

Which brought her to her latest thought.

Naruto.

The blond had last been seen by Tenzo and his squad, dropping the unconscious teen near a well-traversed trade route- but not so close that he would take to attacking caravans. The plan had been for his sealed chakra to temper the Yokai in his Limbic System, and the weary trek towards the trade route to use up most of the latent chakra that escaped sealing- and was just enough to sate the body's requirement of chakra. Hopefully, the exhaustive trek would use up the Yokai and Naruto would end up being carried into a border town- the very one that Jiraiya was stationed at.

However, Naruto didn't show, and Jiraiya's spies had reported that a man drabbed in Akatsuki garb had been seen holding a boy of Naruto's description. Jiraiya, naturally, had gone in search of this Akatsuki member, but had gotten held up in a border town- which was filled with his most devout fans, as he'd gleefully explained.

Tsunade had hit him so hard she'd nearly hurt her own hand.

Since then, not hide nor hair of the blond Jinchuuriki had been seen in any part of Jiraiya's spy network. Tsunade had had no choice but to (unofficially, of course) label Naruto as dead.

It was one of the most horrible things she had ever experienced. _Nothing_ came anywhere close to what she'd felt- the closest would be how she'd felt after the deaths of Nawaki and Dan- her brother and lover, respectively. Glancing down, she saw the drawer holding Naruto's Hitai-Ate- and that damnable necklace. Tsunade knew that considering it cursed was stupid, and had been well on her way to the road to recovery every mission that Naruto came back alive on, but the evidence that she'd ultimately lost all of those people she'd let into her heart still hurt. And it hurt all the worse given how deeply Naruto had wormed his way in after all those years keeping everyone she knew at arm's length.

And now Naruto would never get to realize his dream, never get to become Hokage-

And it was all her fault. She should never have given him the necklace, she should never have opened her heart to him. She should never had sent him on that thrice-damned mission-

She never should have agreed on the banishment.

The meeting with the elders to explain it had been pure hell. Koharu and Homura spent the entire time griping about Jiraiya's inadequacies while Danzo seemed rather impassive at the unfortunate turn of events- something that unnerved the Godaime, for some odd reason that she couldn't fathom.

She'd have to keep an eye of him, that's for sure.

Sighing, Tsunade glanced at her finished paperwork before looking out at the village. The sunny sky belied the chill in the air that didn't come from the oncoming winter.

A storm was approaching. And the only question was, would the ninja world survive it?

~~***~~

Deep within Amegakure, the rain poured down relentlessly, though Madara barely noticed it as he moved towards his destination- the high tower in the South where his subordinates could be found.

While outward appearances belied no emotion- a good reason he wore the mask, as try as he might, his poker face wasn't perfect- inwardly, he was seething.

The two Konoha ANBU that Sasori had brought in had proven immensely important- both on Danzo's plans and in the creation of the Zetsu Army. With the knowledge on Danzo's movements, Madara could plan accordingly- and perhaps even set it up so that the insufferable man could meet his untimely demise.

The Wood Release user, however, was another story.

That he had been created in an experiment by Orochimaru meant that the man had known of his plans to some extent- given the tiny snake whose venom seemed quite capable of hindering usage of the Wood Release- was unsettling, though not pertinent. The knowledge that Konoha had gotten rid of their Jinchuuriki confirmed the reports that Sasori, Kakuzu and Zetsu had provided, so little new knowledge was garnered there.

No, what made the Wood Release user so important was that he'd had the Shodai Hokage's blood within him, allowing the Zetsu army to at least double in power- something that would prove useful when the time came to declare war.

And he also gave knowledge that it was Suna's Godaime that had told the Elemental Nations about the goals of Akatsuki, causing him to speed up the process in which they would gather the Jinchuuriki- not that it proved any use, seeing as the Kyuubi's latest Jinchuuriki had somehow managed to thwart every attempt they made at capturing a Jinchuuriki.

Madara had even lost control over the Yondaime Mizukage- however impossible that was.

And then they'd dropped off the face of the Elemental Nations for almost two years, only to crop up _just as_ Hidan and Kakuzu had taken down the Nibi Jinchuuriki. The loss of Kakuzu was easily gotten over, while the loss of the Nibi to the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki was the last straw.

Yakushi Kabuto, the third captive, proved impossibly important towards Madara's plans to take out Orochimaru- having the right-hand man of the Snake Sannin yielded countless pieces of information concerning the Sannin, even on the inner workings of his body-possession jutsu. Madara now held the knowledge of just how much the Snake Sannin knew of their plans and how he'd planned against them. He'd have to make a move against Orochimaru soon, if the preparations set up were any indication.

Madara entered through an alcove, stepping inside and hanging up his coat before proceeding towards the room where Konan and Tendo- Nagato's preferred body of the Six Paths.

_As if it would bring their dead friend back..._

Madara didn't even so much as acknowledge the existence of the door before stepping straight through it and towards the two people waiting on the far side, near an alcove.

"Konan. Nagato." Madara cordially greeted them, moving to stand against the far wall. His tone of voice left nothing to the imagination concerning his mood. Of the two, however, only Konan shifted uncomfortably, and Madara idly noted that she was probably jealous that Nagato could not be there in person.

"Madara." Tendo acknowledged, the face impassive, never showing any emotion- expected, when possessing the bodies of the dead; only the Shuredo could display emotion, and that was only made possible with the use of different faces for each expression. "What do you want."

_How quick to cut to the chase..._

"There are currently 8 Jinchuuriki out there, depending on each other to survive." Madara said, not really explaining since it was Nagato himself who reached that conclusion. "The only one left is the Hachibi, who will undoubtedly be put on lock-down, making it's capture easy."

"It will be the first victory towards Akatsuki." Konan remarked, partly wanting to give some semblance of reason for being there, and partly to mock Madara for all his shortcomings in capturing the Jinchuuriki.

"Which is why nothing can go wrong with the person to be sent." Madara answered. "After all, being known as a tailed beast without a tail makes him overqualified."

"You're sending Kisame?" Tendo almost seemed to quirk an eyebrow, which Madara was impressed at- conveying enough emotion to nearly make the Path show it as well was quite a feat.

"Of course." Madara shifted his gaze to the side, looking out the alcove at the rain pouring down. "Out of all of those in Akatsuki, he's the only one capable of taking down a Jinchuuriki- and bringing it in for extraction."

"Surely that isn't all that you're here for?" Konan's mistrustful voice carried across the room, and Madara stopped leaning against the wall and fixed both her and Tendo a hard look.

"How astute." He commented. "You are correct, though. I do have one last order of business to take care of with you."

"What are you planning?" This time Tendo spoke, breaking his silence. Madara smirked, amusement showing in his one visible eye.

"The Raikage will not stand for having one of the last two Jinchuuriki disappear. He is undoubtedly calling for a Gokage Summit as we speak." Madara noted that he had garnered the interest of Konan as well, something that was quite rare. "It's held in the Land of Iron, residing within the Three Wolves Mountains."

"Do you plan on sending Zetsu to infiltrate it?" Tendo questioned, and Madara shook his head in the negative.

"No. He is off on his own mission." Konan seemed to tense up, having figured out what he was planning. _Smart girl..._ "The two of you, with my guidance, will attack the Summit."

~~***~~

Deep in the northern part of the Land of Valleys, a single man stepped out from amongst the bloody battle held within the small living quarters. Within were the remains of the body of the Snake Sannin, and covering the walls were bits and pieces of white snakes, which seemed to be attached like scales to a giant snake-thing with a face similar to Orochimaru. The head of the snake-thing lay within a puddle of blood, the rest of the body having been used to paint the entire room red with flecks of white in the remnants of the giant snake-thing.

Stepping out of the room, the victor of the battle wore a long-sleeved shirt open to reveal the torso, allowing quick removal for the effects of the Level 2 Curse Seal to properly be used. The bottom of the shirt was tied to his body by a large rope wrapped around his waist, the knot being used to hold his sword's sheath. Over his forearms he wore arm guards, though they were primarily toughened fabric instead of actual armor. His hair was short and hung down over his eyes, which couldn't be seen in the shadow.

"Now I can achieve my goal." The person whispered, before looking up with Yellow slitted eyes that morphed into the blood-red of the Sharingan. "Now that I have the Sharingan, I will learn the secret to immortality. Uchiha Madara will cower before me, Orochimaru!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have yet to see a fic where orochimaru actually took over sasuke's body.


	20. The View

Yugito groaned, lifting an arm to clench a handful of her hair as she swam into consciousness. Feeling hands grasp hers and pull them away, she tried to remember where she was and what happened.

"Stop fidgeting." A cool voice said above her, moving her arms back down to her side, and she tried to open her eyes only to have the sudden inclusion of light blind her, forcing them tightly shut. As she wracked her brain, the person above her seemed to be able to read her mind. "You were attacked and injured. I and my friend-"

 _Akatsuki!_ Yugito clenched her eyelids tightly as the influx of memories invaded her mind. Flashes of the sudden ambush came to mind, with it the memory of the Raikage telling both her and Bee that if either of them were to come into contact with anyone wearing a black cloak with red clouds, they were to hightail it back to Kumo- or the nearest Hidden Village, if the case may be. She'd been on a mission to route a group of bandits from one of the old war supply buildings when a man wearing a Taki Hitai-Ate, and the red-pocked cloak, appeared in front of them. He'd asked for Yugito to come quietly, or he'd resort to violence. She and Atsui, a hot-headed Jonin and fellow blond, had attempted to retreat when Atsui had been clipped by a large scythe with three red blades.

From the nearby brush, a man dressed similarly stepped out, the scythe retracting into his grip where he _ate Atsui's blood_. The man's skin had changed color, becoming a mixture of blacks and whites, almost like one of those scary voodoo emblems she'd feared when she was younger. At that point, they found their escape impossible, the only way out back inside the supply building.

So they ran, and kept running until Atsui started developing injuries from nothing. It had started small, cuts on his legs and arms, until there were deep holes and punctured lungs.

Yugito had left Atsui coughing up blood, the sight of him lying there drowning in a pool of his own blood sure to haunt her nightmares. Moving through the dark hallways, Yugito realized that there was truly no escaping. The supply building had no escape tunnels, as if it was attacked, the inhabitants would rather it be destroyed than taken by the enemy. So she pulled out her pouch- and Atsui's, who'd assured her that he wouldn't need it- and set about preparing a trap. Leading the duo through the complex, she thought she'd trapped them and given herself the advantage when they'd acted like dying was an everyday thing, leaving her with the only choice left- to draw on the Nibi's Yokai.

From there, the fight had seemed to go in her favor- the silver-haired one had been easily killed and she'd sent the masked one on the retreat. But the man she'd thought she'd killed _didn't die_. She'd used all she knew against him- Nibi's fire-tongue, a weakened form of the Biju Ball (Yugito had never been able to form a full-power one, even after training in the Yokai for more than a decade), but nothing she did even seemed to make him notice. After the Biju Ball, she'd had to stop drawing on the Nibi- her own reserves were becoming strained, and she had no delusions of risking the Biju going free. Using Taijutsu, she found that it was pointless- the silver-haired man, who had introduced himself as Hidan, had used his scythe to get a sample of her blood, ingesting it like he'd done with Atsui's blood. Raising one of his arms, he'd sliced his own arm open, letting the blood flow down on the ground and shifting his feet so that the blood drew an odd pattern of a triangle within a circle. Moving to stop him, she'd struck the second his foot stopped, attacking with a hail of Kunai. He let them hit, causing minor wounds all over his torso.

Which appeared on Yugito's torso as well.

With growing horror, Yugito realized what had happened to Atsui. Running to take him on, he'd pulled out a pike and masterfully used it to skewer both her hands before launching it- and her- into a piece of wall, where she'd struggled to free herself before blacking out from the pain of the wounds Hidan had inflicted on her from that jutsu of his.

Returning back to present, Yugito snapped her eyes open and moved to attack her captors. If she had been captured for the extraction of her Biju, she'd ensure that she'd take down one of them. One less for Bee and the rest of Kumo to deal with. Shifting her body, she'd had the man above her in a choke hold before he melted into water and was back above her, several other forms moving to restrain her.

"Hey, hey, hey!" The man took hold of her head, holding it still while several others held her down. "Is that any way to treat your rescuers?"

_Wha..._

Looking around, Yugito realized that none of these people resembled the two people who'd attacked her, nor were they wearing the trademark cloaks known for Akatsuki members. The first people she noticed was a mop of blond hair. Holding down her excitement, the hair's owner was a teen, sixteen at the most, with a trio of whisker-like birthmarks on his cheeks, eerily reminiscent of the greatest traitors of Kumo. Next to him was a red-head, also sixteen, who was pale in comparison to the blond's tanned skin, and had dark rings around his sea-green eyes. To his side, finishing the group holding her legs was a teal-haired girl, a little older than the two boys, with almost glowing magenta eyes.

Four people held onto her arms, and all were much older than the teens. There was an armored giant, looking much like a samurai would, with an odd contraption connected to his back that emitted steam. The only part of his face that was visible were his eyes, which served to pierce through all they gazed upon. Next to him, and aiding to hold her left arm, was a shorter man, with red hair and a more casual look in his garb, wearing what looked to be a turtle-neck and jeans. Holding down her right arm was a short man with cropped silvery-gray hair, who wore a pair of indigo pants with a forest green tee. The final man was the same one she'd heard when she awoke, having a slim frame and wearing something similar to Iwa Jonin. His hair was slick too, though it also seemed to fall over his face, hiding part of it from view.

And none of them looked like they were intending on removing the Nibi.

Slacking up on her struggles, they just stare at her before the blond teen speaks up.

"You done?" She mutely nods, and they set her down on the cot she'd been laying on. Looking at them, she turns to the one that looks like the leader- the small man in the tee.

"How?" The rest of the question goes unsaid, and she's answered by the red-headed teen.

"Utakata and myself were dispatched to see what the source of Yokai was as we were passing through. Once we arrived, both of us engaged Akatsuki in combat and Utakata killed one of them before healing you." The red-head summed up before falling silent. After several seconds, the one who she'd tried to attack spoke up.

"Killing him wasn't much of a problem, and healing you took some time." the now-named Utakata chimed in, drawing her attention. "There were tons of injuries on you, not to mention the damage caused from those pikes through your hands. It'll help if you don't strain them for the next few days, though. While I did heal you, it doesn't mean that you should go back to active duty."

"Right." Yugito raised her right hand, looking at the whole palm that stared right back at her. Such healing prowess not even Tsunade of the Sannin could perform. "How did you heal me? Not even the best medics could have-"

"The Rokubi's Yokai is formidable power when it comes to healing." Utakata explained before jerking his thumb at the blond. "Only thing that comes close is Naruto's regenerative powers."

"I'm awesome that way." Naruto replied with a toothy smile.

"Right." Utakata deadpanned, turning back to Yugito and ignoring the whining of Naruto. "Anyway, we insist you travel with us."

"Wha- Rokubi?" Yugito prided herself on keeping up with the state of affairs, but that comment on the Rokubi threw her for a loop.

"Yeah. I'm the guy holding it, where else would you find the Rokubi's Yokai?" Yugito was floored at that revelation, and it must have showed on her face, because the group seemed to look at her in concern.

"You sure she's okay?" The girl next to Naruto spoke up, and she shrunk under the glare the blond was giving her.

"Of course not." Utakata answered, gesturing at the girl sitting on the cot. "To the world, we've disappeared after the Akatsuki was seen in the last place we were known to be at. They probably think everyone here is dead."

"It seems that you need to more practice at figuring out the emotional state of a person given the situation around them." The armored giant added, gaining the nod of the red-headed man next to him. The girl sulked before grabbing Naruto's arm and yanking him away.

"Nothing below the waist!" the red-headed man called at the two. "Neither of you are old enough to be parents!"

"FUCK YOU, ROSHI!" Naruto yelled at him, half-heartedly protesting at being dragged away from where the action was. Roshi only laughed in response, and Yugito's brain finally caught up with what was going on around her.

"So, you are the missing Jinchuuriki." Yugito stated, receiving nods in return. "Utakata has the Rokubi, that much I figured. What of the rest of you? For that matter, what are your names?"

"Names Roshi. Got the Yonbi." Roshi said, giving a small wave.

"Han. Gobi." The tall man stated. "Younger brother of Roshi."

"Kurosuna no Gaara. Shukaku." The teenage red-head spoke, and then looked to the smallest of the group.

"Tadashii Yagura. Sanbi." Hearing the Biju, Yugito started.

"But you're dead!" Yagura gave her a rueful smile.

"That's what people think. I haven't seen fit to correct them." Yugito nodded, before posing her next question.

"And one of those two who went off is the Nanabi Jinchuuriki." Roshi answered this time.

"Yeah. Fu is." He briefly paused. "You didn't ask about the gaki."

"Well, he obviously isn't a Jinchuuriki. The Kyuubi Jinchuuriki is still in Konoha, under lock and key." She noticed the blank looks they were giving her. "Right?"

"The gaki's got one hell of a cover story, I'll give 'em that much." Roshi spoke first, and his comment served to set the mood of the conversation.

"Konoha lied?" Yugito was astonished, and it clearly showed. Brushing a lock of hair out of her face, she used the moment to compose herself. "Why would they do that? For that matter, why aren't any of you dead? I thought Akatsuki-"

"Ah, those are all related." Utakata cut in, taking control of the conversation. "See, they banished Naruto because of what happened when he reached the first tail in the cloak."

"The temper?" Yugito was confused, and her face showed it. "But that's common knowledge to any village that's had a Jinchuuriki, and I know for a fact that Konoha has had at least one Jinchuuriki before... Naruto, you said?" At the confirmation, she continued. "Those Jinchuuriki also used Kyuubi in battle, so they should have already known what would've happened."

"Except Naruto is the child of the previous Kyuubi Jinchuuriki." Yagura dove into the conversation. "They couldn't have known about _that_."

"But, those are just myths." Yugito replied. "There's no way that those stories are true."

"They are." Utakata told her. "Those 'myths' of yours are recounts of what happened in Kiri with the Kaguya and Yuki clans. Ever since, they've been careful not to create more Children, and the stories spread to the Elemental Nations. You'd be hard-pressed to find a Hidden Village that held a Jinchuuriki that had children- outside of Konoha, of course." He added.

"But how's he..." Yugito could tell, from the few moments she'd seen of the blond teen, that he was very much sane.

"The Yondaime Hokage was a bit of a genius in that regard." Yagura explained. "He took half the Kyuubi with him to the Shinigami's stomach while the other half was sealed within Naruto. That alone was enough to curb the affect from being outright insanity.

"It was only temporary insanity." Yagura finished.

"What?" If Yugito wasn't skilled enough to tell when someone was lying, she'd have believed that the facts they were telling them were nothing more than fiction. As it was, however... "They banished him because he was temporarily insane and kept up appearances that they had him under lock and key. I didn't think Konoha was capable of doing such a thing."

"They are." Gaara spoke for the first time since giving his name. "Naruto's parentage is another thing they kept from him. His father in particular."

"Why? Who's his father?" Yugito queried. "And for that matter, you still haven't explained why you aren't dead."

"His mother was the previous Jinchuuriki, you need to understand that." Yagura told her. "And keep it in mind, with the stories you've heard, when I tell you that his father was none other than the Yondaime Hokage."

"No." Yugito uttered. "Konoha can't possibly be capable of that. If it was Kumo, I'd believe it in a heartbeat, but not Konoha."

"You must understand that there supposedly were extenuating circumstances during Naruto's birth, but that doesn't mean that Namikaze is free of guilt." Yagura elaborated, and Yugito mutely nodded.

"And how you're all alive?" Here everyone showed varying levels of sheepishness.

"Honestly, Naruto kinda brought us together. Call it some kinda freakish luck or an act of Kami, but he met us in his travels and somehow we're all here. The kid's odd that way." Utakata chuckled. "He has the devil's luck, and uses it when gambling. Remember this: _never_ bet against him. It'll serve you well while you're with us."

Yugito chuckled, and figured that it might be worth it to stick around this rag-tag group. Idly, she wondered what was going on in Kumo at that moment.

~~***~~

Within the Raikage's quarters, all was not well. The Yondaime Raikage, Ay, had heard of Yugito's disappearance when she'd failed to report with Atsui earlier that day. Ever since the mass vanishing of Jinchuuriki, both Kumo and Konoha had gone into lockdown, protecting their Jinchuuriki as much as they could.

Of course, there was only so much of his brother that Kumogakure, in general, could handle.

So, after a year and a half of nothing on the word of Akatsuki, the Raikage had allowed Bee and Yugito to freely exit the village- provided they had a Jonin with them at all times. The pair had taken up missions again, and Bee had moved back into Unraikyo. Yugito had gone on a simple mission, barely B-Ranked, and had gone with Atsui, who had clear orders to make contact with Kumo once they reached the supply building and when they'd finished and on their way. He'd made contact when they'd reached the building, giving an estimate of how long it would take to clear the building.

The time came for the return message and passed, and no word was given.

Being the prudent man he was, the Raikage had sent out a team to ensure that nothing had happened. They'd sent back word of the remains of a massive battle where the supply building once was, even citing the heavy feel of Yokai in the area. Once that had happened, the Raikage himself had gone out to see it, and surveyed the area meticulously, giving him two conclusions.

That the Akatsuki had taken another Biju, bringing the count up to seven.

A Gokage Summit needed to convene to deal with the problem, and he knew just the place for it to be held, too.

Upon his return, the Raikage had sent a dozen of his best Jonin to Unraikyo with orders to ensure that no one, save for the Raikage himself, to get within a mile of his brother before sending out the summons for the Gokage Summit.

He'd ensure that Akatsuki was stopped at all costs.

~~***~~

In Konoha, the summons reached the Godaime quickly, and she sent word to the village of her absence before choosing her two escorts: Jiraiya and Shizune. The latter was an obvious decision (as if Tsunade would be seen without her faithful ward), while the former was a shock. The majority of Konoha had figured that Jiraiya would take over while Tsunade was at the Summit, not go with her. As it was, the many skilled Chunin and Jonin were prepping for the period she would be away from the village, the elders politely choosing Shimura Danzo as acting Hokage during that time, setting the entire Shinobi force on edge.

In one of the many training grounds, one Chunin Haruno Sakura wove her hands through a set of hand seals, watching her surroundings carefully. Her opponents were skilled in tracking, but she herself did not consider herself one of Konoha's foremost Genjutsu users for nothing. Moving, she left no trace that she was ever there, though if an outsider were to wander into the clearing, they'd find the image of her hard at work, prepping the area with traps.

Shifting through the forest, Sakura knew that laying down such specific Genjutsu did nothing to stop her tail, only delay them. Running into a small clearing, Sakura's beset from the side by a large dog, and pinned down until she fades into nothing.

"Damn, one of her Genjutsu." A voice comes down from above. "C'mon Akamaru, Shino, we've still got to find her before the timer goes off."

And on that note, fellow Chunin Inuzuka Kiba and Aburame Shino go off in search of their target. In the distance, Sakura's hit from behind by a well-placed strike to the bottom of her back, taking out her legs. As she lays there, she looks up at her captor.

In the more than three years since visiting Naruto, all of them had changed, becoming more open with their downfalls and becoming all the better for them, but none had changed as much as Hyuuga Hinata. She had spent the first few days after having seen Naruto in an unintelligible funk, crying her eyes out and spending time with all her friends- even bunking with Kurenai for several days, before emerging a new person. She took to her training with vigor, determined to prove her former crush wrong. She rose through the ranks, and had recently been promoted to Jonin, sharing the title with her cousin Neji and his teammates Lee and Tenten, though she was only a Tokubetsu. Of the remaining Konoha 11, they were all Chunin, though the entirety of Team 10 were shoo-ins to make Jonin any day now.

Of course, their opinion of Naruto hadn't changed much in the years since they saw him- they were divided in their views that Naruto couldn't control what he was saying, so none of it was his fault, while the rest of them thought that he was just being brutally honest, and didn't deserve their friendship if that's what he really thought of them. Because of that, a rift had opened up between the once-friends, and they drifted apart, only coming together when training or on missions.

"You caught me, guess that proves you've earned your Jonin rank." Sakura smiled weakly, and Hinata returned it while helping Sakura to lean up against a tree while she regained feeling in her legs.

"Of course." Hinata curtly answered. "What, did you think I only got it out of luck?"

"Kinda, I mean, that's just like how-" Sakura clamped her mouth shut, knowing that the subject of Naruto had become taboo within the group. Even their Jonin-Sensei had avoided the blond as a topic. "I mean, out of our graduating class, I never though you'd make it to Jonin first."

"I know." Hinata replied. "Out of all of us, I most saw Shino or Shikamaru making it to Jonin first, not me."

"Right." Sakura said, feeling uncomfortable. "So how-"

"I am fine, as is Neji and his team." Hinata coldly answered, and Sakura flinched. The two of them headed the different ideals on how to think of Naruto's comments on them.

_If only Naruto could be cured, then we'd all be friends again..._

~~***~~

Within a dark cave Itachi and Kisame stood, waiting for their comrades to appear in the hazy fog that signaled that the meeting was beginning. Suddenly, there was the sound of static as several figures appeared out of the dark, their shimmering forms illuminating the cave. One by one, the members appeared- Pein, Konan, Zetsu, Deidara, Sasori, Hidan and a new person- a man whose features were hidden behind a mask, the only thing belying that he had a face beneath was a single hole for the right eye. Kakuzu, however, was not present.

"Everyone." Pein began. "Originally, our plan was to take the Biju and turn them into a weapon to use against the Elemental Nations. However, the Jinchuuriki for eight of the nine Biju have proven too powerful to simply subdue and capture.

"In two days, the five Kage will meet in the Land of Iron for something that has not happened since the early days of the Hidden Villages: the Gokage Summit." Pein intoned. "Myself and Konan will be going there with the goal of killing the Kage and replacing them with specialized clones. While we do that, Hidan will report to our base in the Land of Demons. He will meet up with Zetsu and join with Sasori as they prepare to enact the first wave of the final Shinobi World War."

"So we're finally doing it then, hmm." Deidara gleefully cackled. "What do I do?"

"You, along with Kisame, will be visited by Zetsu and given your respective orders in person." Pein answered.

"What about the new guy?" Kisame asked, gesturing towards the masked man. Pein was about to answer when the man in question spoke up.

"I have some information to give to Itachi." His voice was cold, even- and Kisame seemed confused, having recognized it but unable to place it. While Kisame was trying to recall where he heard that voice before, the masked man turned to Itachi, who did nothing to reveal his utter hatred of the man before him. Madara, for his part, saw the hate and ignored it in favor of doing his part. "It seems that Sasori's fight with Orochimaru weakened him more than we realized. Thus far we have known that that snake has lived far beyond the point where he should have died, yet I bring in new details.

"He has taken residence in a new body- one of your brother, Uchiha Sasuke."

Itachi's eyes widened before the atmosphere within the cave became suffocating, killing several bats. As the carcasses fell around them (Kisame having noticed and reveled in the Killing Intent), Itachi asked a single word, one which gave his intentions to those that were observant enough to know.

"Where." Madara's eye, barely seen in the shadow of his mask, seemed to curve and dance with amusement.

"His current hideout, according to our informant," Here Madara gestured towards Sasori, who was credited in taking Kabuto captive. "is in the Eastern edge of the Land of Lightning- his northernmost hideout."

Itachi said nothing, only turning and leaving the cave, taking the Killing Intent with him. Madara simply watched on as each of the members faded from existence, and he joined them in their return to their bodies.

He had several things to set up with Zetsu- both of them, before going to watch the fruit of Itachi's labors.

_That snake won't know what hit him. All that needs to happen now is they kill themselves, there will be no more obstacles between me and success..._

~~***~~

Orochimaru walked through the hallways, watching in amusement as the many test subjects were cowed in his presence, doubly so considering that the majority of them were in the Level 2 of the Curse Seal. Approaching the head scientist of the facility, he awaited the debriefing he was waiting for.

"As of this morning, we have over 200 subjects imbued with the Curse Seal, with more scheduled to be given it in the coming days." The man, one Satoshi Aoi, spoke, giving the needed details in as little time as possible. "All of them are able to go to Level 2, while only a small percentage are able to withhold their mind. However," He continued before Orochimaru could speak up. "Those few are able to command the rest in ways that we can't."

"And their loyalties?" Aoi smirked.

"To you, sir." Aoi waited for a beat before continuing. "Patient Zero has shown that he has the potential to control his impulses, but is more concerned with not hurting people, so progress has not gone as far as we'd hoped in that area."

"When will they be battle-ready?" Orochimaru looked bored as he gazed over the cowering forms in his presence.

"All of the subjects are combat ready, and the newer ones need mere hours to acclimate to the Curse Seal before becoming battle-ready." Orochimaru smiled, tearing his gaze away from the group.

"Excellent. Has word been sent from your sister facility in the South on the status of their projects?"

"Of course." Aoi looked flustered. "The studies have shown that it is _not_ possible for a soul to be summoned once it has been sealed, while different talismans can be used for varying degrees of control over the soul. They have gathered dozens of different DNA samples, along with living people, to use. The resurrected, of course, can be unsummoned at any point, while control over their soul does not diminish in the slightest, as several test subjects have been unsummoned and then summoned again, with no noticeable affects outside of the chakra consumption required for the summoning."

Orochimaru looked satisfied, for the most part, but wasn't completely appeased.

"And of their other project?" Here Aoi was visibly uncomfortable, and it took a single glance and the snake Sannin's once-yellow eyes to give all that he knew on the subject matter.

"So far, they are proving to be hard to tame, while the power they emit are massive. I must admit that they truly are the most formidable out of all of your test subjects." Aoi took a breath to steady himself. "Otherwise, they report everything as going according to schedule."

Orochimaru gave a disarming smile to Aoi, who relaxed before collapsing on the ground, comatose. Within Orochimaru's eyes an atomic structure made of red rings could be seen surrounding the black pupil, while the rest of the iris surrounding the red formation was just as black as the pupil.

" _Now_ we shall see who the stronger of us is, Madara."


	21. Sight

"So, has someone gone to make sure that Naruto and Fu aren't doing the nasty?" Utakata's blunt statement cut through the air and caught everyone's attention. Most of the group rolled their eyes at his choice of words while Roshi had gotten up to ensure that neither teen were going to be parents anytime soon. Yugito, for her part, was watching their reaction with growing amusement, sitting next to Utakata as they ate dinner- rabbit stew, if she heard right. Ever since she'd woken up in their care several days ago, she'd found their antics hilarious (though if anyone called her out on it, she'd kill them without so much as a single thought).

As she'd learned, Fu had originally launched herself at Naruto and clung to him, having proclaimed that they were something akin to soulmates- or something like that. Apparently, Fu's upbringing had her thinking that Jinchuuriki were a species separate from Human (which sparked her ire and required the majority of the group in holding her down before something bad could happen), so when she'd felt the attraction to Naruto, she'd latched onto it and didn't let go. As they'd continued their travels, Fu had let up on her clingy-ness, and even had corrected her way of thinking, The idea of that woman having once thought that she was a species other than Human and had no qualms in using all the power her Biju had against humanity was frightening.

"I wonder how long until Roshi realizes that they can feel him coming." Gaara mused on the other side of the fire, and that sparked a ripple of laughs from the remaining Jinchuuriki.

Gaara, Yugito was told, had once been a psychopathic insomniac, killing anyone who even _looked_ at him oddly. Even then, it was only after Naruto had beaten him and instilled the knowledge that friends were the greatest source of strength one could ever need that the red-haired teen had changed.

For some reason, Yugito couldn't imagine the amicable teen in front of her with that of the psychopath that he'd once been.

"Really." Han remarked. "Anyone else would've long since learned that those two only do it when they have the greatest chance of being caught. Brother going only ensures that they're doing it."

Han was one of the more open of the group, as Yugito found out. When she (or anyone in their group, for that matter) needed to talk, the giant seemed to instantly know and spirit them to the edge of the camp or group, listen to their worries and then console them.

The man also had one hell of a sense of humor, when it came down to it. She'd been regaled with horror stories of when he'd played pranks on the others in the group, or those he'd worked with back before leaving his Hidden Village.

Which brought her to her inner dilemma.

She knew that, as Jinchuuriki, they were all Shinobi of each of the 5 greater Hidden Villages, with the exception of Fu, who came from Takigakure. As such, they'd all held at least Chunin rank, though from what she heard, Naruto had been a Genin when he'd left Konoha.

_Which doesn't make sense..._

Yugito shook her head, banishing those thoughts for a later time, and returning to the fact at hand. Each of the different Jinchuuriki had had different reasons for leaving their Hidden Village, and that was the problem in her eyes- they'd left.

She'd been taught that being a Jinchuuriki was a great honor, as it made them one of the strongest Shinobi in all the Elemental Nations. And with that honor came the duty to their Hidden Village, living to serve as it's diligent soldier until they died from either old age or in battle.

But she knew that most didn't even have that chance, dying from failing to fully control their Biju. She herself could not be counted as having total control over the Nibi, the most she could do was draw on enough Yokai to become the Bakeneko for a little over a minute- any more and she ran the risk of it pulling in too much of her chakra and killing her.

But that wasn't what was bothering her.

They'd left their Hidden Villages, abandoning them for some reason she couldn't fathom. Such a sense of independent-mindedness was what she couldn't understand. _Why_ would a Jinchuuriki go missing-nin?

The answer, she'd observed, was in the form of two hitherto unknown factors.

The Akatsuki, allowing for the Jinchuuriki to leave their village without being labeled as missing-nin.

One Uzumaki Naruto, who the group had attributed with having been the entire reason they were together.

"You didn't have to go all crazy on us, did you?" Grumbled a smooth-toned voice behind her, and from the darkness a put-out Naruto and Fu were being led by a nearly apoplectic Roshi.

_Speak of the devil..._

"You're too young to be doing those kinds of things!" Roshi seemed near the edge, and Yugito needed only one look at both teen straightening their pants to realize the scene that the older man must have walked in on.

"So what, we just wait until we're your age? Is that it?" Naruto retorted, and the Yonbi Jinchuuriki sputtered, trying to find some way out of the wall he'd backed himself into. Next to the teen, Fu slung her arm over Naruto's shoulders, pulling him into an impromptu make-out session that looked to send Roshi into conniptions.

Yugito tried, she really did, but no matter how she looked at it, she couldn't see what it was about the blond teen that drew the others to him- and even deferred to him, no less! All she saw was an immature man who took too much pleasure in making the older members of the group uncomfortable.

 _Maybe it's when he fights..._ Yugito mused to herself, before snapping back to reality to find that she'd been staring at Utakata. Glancing away, she turned back to the small fire and huddled closer to it, once more grateful that they'd taken the time to outfit her in garb more suited for the snowy land of the Land of Iron. Feeling the rush of heat to her face, Yugito was internally thankful that they were in a cold environment, lest the rising blush on her face might be attributed to something other than the chill in the air.

It wasn't like she _didn't_ find Utakata attractive, much the opposite, in fact, but it was that she'd never been in a relationship- nor did she have any idea of how one with her would proceed, having spent most of her time training to reach the status of Jonin and fighting to gain the amount of control over the Nibi as she'd gotten rather than spending her free time trolling the dating scene.

Still, it didn't mean that she was ready to start doing so at a time like _this_.

~~***~~

Packing up his tent, Utakata glanced over at the newest member of their group, and was eternally grateful for the extensive vascular training that he'd learned when he was in Kiri's hunter division.

Hefting the small bag that held all his stuff over his shoulder, he moved to talk with his closest friend.

"Hey, you got a minute?" Utakata didn't really need to wait for an answer before he continued. "See, I-"

"You are crushing on the woman." Han's blunt statement, earned a deadpanned glare from Utakata, and the two shifted to start their trek into the territory of the Samurai, moving several paces behind the rest of the group.

"Say it a little louder why don't ya?" Utakata joked, and then turned ashen as he saw the glint in Han's eyes. "Joking! Joking!"

"But you _are_ infatuated with her." It wasn't a question, and Utakata only nodded, the color slowly returning to his face.

"Yeah." Here Han looked thoughtful, and focused on the path ahead for several moments before replying.

"And you aren't sure if she feels the same way." Utakata nodded once more, not even questioning how the man had figured that fact out. Han's next comment, however, had him seriously wondering why the giant was the confidante of the group. "Why haven't you asked her, then?"

"Are you kidding?" Utakata kept his voice low, glancing at the group in front of them before continuing. "How would that solve my problem?"

"You would ultimately know if your infatuation was well-founded or not." Han answered with a shrug of the shoulders, and Utakata had to fight not to leave an imprint of his face in the snow-laden grown in front of him. "And it would open the floor for discussion, allowing her the chance to learn if the two of you should be together. Real love comes from knowing everything about your partner and not caring." Han's sagely advice came with a pat on the back, sending Utakata reeling forward, and he had to fight not to fall onto Yugito, who was conversing with Yagura directly ahead of them.

"Is there a reason you've interrupted our talk, Utakata?" Yagura quirked an eyebrow at the taller male, who only gave an apology and then began to mutter about "meddling giants who don't know anything". Ignoring the mutterings of the Rokubi Jinchuuriki, Yagura turned to Yugito. "It seems that our talk has come to an end. I should make sure that Naruto isn't doing anything to send Roshi into an early grave." An indignant "hey!" could be heard from the front of the group, and within seconds, Yagura was next to the blond teen in the procession, leaving the pair alone.

Glancing behind him Utakata was given the the hand-shove of 'go on' from Han, and turned back to find that Yugito was trying not to stare at him.

"Somethin' on my face?" Here the tables were turned, with Yugito being the flustered one, and Utakata feeling uncomfortable at having freaked out the woman he liked.

Han's eyeroll from behind was not lost on him, and he mentally added Han to his Death List- the people who, if he could get away with it, he'd kill.

The fact that Han was a regular name on that list did not make itself known to the lanky man.

"If you don't wanna talk, that's fine." Utakata spoke, banishing all plans of Han's slow and painful death to the back of his mind- no doubt to be brought to the forefront the next time the giant did something that Utakata didn't agree with.

"No, no. I do want to talk." Yugito replied, bringing Utakata's gaze upon her own, gazing into those beautifully slanted eyes that seemed to glint in the-

 _Not now!_ Utakata once more squashed the part of his mind that found Yugito attractive, knowing full well that it wasn't a permanent solution.

"Right, right." Utakata stalled, inwardly panicking at the prospect of regular conversation. "So, you're from Kumo, huh?" At her dubious nod, he continued. "What was it like?"

"Honestly?" She looked at him askance. "It was... strange."

"Strange." Utakata repeated the word, trying- and failing- to understand that description. "Strange how?"

Like the Shinobi I've worked with have all these weird idiosyncrasies." She laughed. "This one kid's so pessimistic it's hilarious. He's once thought that a thrown rock would bring a mountain down on the village."

"Seriously?" Utakata was trying to hide his laughter.

"Seriously!" Yugito was chuckling, and took a second before continuing. "But that's nothing to the kid's Sensei."

"Bad?" Utakata questions.

"He rapped." Yugito paused, wincing. "horribly."

"No." Utakata shook his head, disbelief marring his face.

"His first words to me still haunt me." Yugito said with another shudder before fixing him with a glare. " _Don't_ ask what they were."

Utakata brought his hands up defensively.

"Wasn't gonna." Yugito playfully punched him in the shoulder, and the two continued talking.

_Maybe there was something to Han's advice after all..._

~~***~~

Itachi could feel the pain in his head, the vertigo from moving as fast as he did, but ignored it in favor of the task at hand. Watching the path ahead of him, he saw the crags and mesas approach him seconds before they would, and he effortlessly moved around them as though they weren't even there. Far ahead of him, he saw the lone watchtower marking his destination- Orochimaru's Northern hideout.

He knew that he was about to enter a battle that he would not survive, yet he only cared about one thing- ensuring that when he died, Orochimaru was taken with him. He'd thought little of the man, having once revered him as having been the genius of his generation, until he met the snake in person- he'd been a smooth-talker, and had he not taken to the Shinobi profession undoubtedly would have been a swindler of the highest degree. The snake Sannin had also been self-centered, only caring about learning the secrets hidden within all Shinobi- what made them capable of manipulating chakra, and what made civilians incapable of doing anything with theirs at all. To that extent, the Sannin had taken to performing gruesome experiments on many people, Shinobi or civilian, living or dead. And in his quest, he'd taken to creating a jutsu that allowed his soul to overwhelm and absorb another's ultimately taking over their body- something that Itachi found distasteful.

Shinobi were eternally aware of their mortality, even more so when they built up a reputation like Orochimaru had with the Sannin, so his quest to extend his life would ultimately prove his downfall- and a quite ironic downfall, given that Itachi, the one man who'd stopped the snake Sannin's attempt to possess his body, would be the one who killed Orochimaru.

Stopping, Itachi could see that he had a kilometer left until he reached the hideout, but fighting in such confines would only lead to pointless deaths as the victims of the Sannin's experiments were caught up in the undoubtedly massive battle. Flaring his chakra as far as he could, he felt the faint echo it sent back to him of the sentries in the tower. They'd obviously felt the pulse and were bound to find him any second now.

That just left waiting for the snake to come out of it's hole.

Closing his eyes, Itachi ignored the strain he felt and let his senses extend all around him, including underground. Given how Orochimaru fought, it would be prudent to-

KRAKOOM!

The ground exploded beneath Itachi, revealing a giant, darkly-purple snake that had an intricate design of black lines stretching over its scales. Within it's massive maw were the crumbling pieces of the ground that Itachi stood on, and was crushed under the full force of the snake's jaws, revealing a deadly row of teeth set for holding it's prey headed by a pair of fangs that _oozed_ a clear liquid that fell onto the patch of dirt, eating away at it like a hot knife through butter. As the mouth closed down, the Summons realized that the only thing in it's mouth was the rapidly dissolving earth. Tilting it's head, the snake looked around, searching for the object of it's hunt, before it was besieged by a seemingly endless barrage of ravens, which soon tore into the snake's skin and began to rent it to pieces. Feeling the danger to it's life, the snake cut it's connection keeping it outside of it's territory, leaving for it's home in the land of the Summons.

"How sad." Itachi commented, standing several yards away, yet looking as though he'd been there all along. "I wonder..."

"Why did I send a Summon to kill you?" Before he knew what was happening, Itachi was sliced in half from behind by the Kusanagi, and Orochimaru stood holding the mythic sword, looking positively gleeful.

His grin didn't waver as the two halves of the Uchiha exploded into ravens and circled him, each wielding the odd Shuriken-shaped Mangekyo Sharingan that their creator possessed.

"Why Itachi, you're later than I expected." Orochimaru taunted, his yellow eyes bleeding into the red of the Sharingan, making the ravens dissolve into black smoke that dissipated into the wind. "Honestly, you just can't count on anyone to be punctual. Kid's these days.." The snake Sannin sighed dramatically, holding his head in the wrist of his hand, the blade of Kusanagi glinting in the light as it was held over its' wielder's head. "Think they know everything."

Orochimaru turned and swung Kusanagi in a full circle, sending out a wave of wind that sliced through the entire valley, revealing Itachi as moved out of his place of hiding, holding two fingers to his lips as he exhaled a cloud of black ash, burning bright with embers, that twisted in the air to reveal a dragon of fire. The fire dragon sent out a massive breath of actual fire that formed into another dragon, which sailed straight for the snake Sannin.

Orochimaru, for his part, simply swung Kusanagi, the blade extending as it halved the second dragon, causing it to implode in a blinding display of fire that turned into a snake and attacked the ash-made dragon that borne it. The two beings fought, searing the air until it was ripe with the dry heat and ash that they emitted, turning the surrounding area into a scene usually found near an active volcano: ash covering the ground and falling from the sky like snow, while burning embers lit up piles of the ashes in great pyres.

It was in this scene that Itachi looked over, watching Orochimaru through his Sharingan, seeing the face of his brother beneath that fake skin that the snake Sannin used to mold his host's form into one like his old body.

Above the Sannin, the two forms fought until they suddenly fell apart, their creators having lost all concentration on keeping the jutsu that borne them. As great pieces of flame and ash dropped to the ground, two forms danced between them, one holding a katana while the other wielded a Kunai. They clashed often, like blurs to the naked eye. Suddenly Orochimaru stopped, twirling Kusanagi in his hand and using a blast of wind to launch one of the falling ash clouds at Itachi, setting it ablaze in the process. Itachi countered by sending a fireball of equal size into the blaze, causing the two to explode brilliantly, igniting the ash in the air and sending a wave of flames towards both fighters. When the flames died down, neither could be seen, until a nearby mesa was halved, falling into the sea of flames that was once the canyon floor.

Standing atop the remains of the mesa, the air around them wavering in the heat, were Itachi and Orochimaru. Neither looked perturbed at the destruction going on around them, only caring that they kill the other. High above them, the sky darkened, the heavy fire and dry air having drawn in all the moisture it could, forming a thunderstorm. Itachi barely noticed the rain as it started to fall, while Orochimaru seemed more interested in the clouds above them than his opponent. Batting away a string of Kunai, he turned his attention back to Itachi.

"You've sealed your demise, Itachi." Orochimaru scolded, wagging Kusanagi as he would a finger. "And here I thought you were smarter than that. For shame."

I see no reason for you to have gained the advantage." Itachi answered, steadying himself as he prepared for whatever the Sannin would throw at him. For his part, Orochimaru laughed, a cold, mocking cackle that set Itachi on edge. Raising his arm in the air, Orochimaru couldn't keep the grin from forming on his face. His hand suddenly became encased in static, the tiny arcs of electricity dancing between his hand and the air.

"Nature manipulation is such an amazing thing." The snake Sannin started, watching his hand in fascination. "Especially when you know how it works."

Up in the sky, there were bright flashes of light as huge arcs of lightning gathered together, drawing Itachi's gaze to the massive beast that was forming out of the lightning, it's mass so dense that it seemed to draw all the electricity from the air.

"Gaze upon true nature manipulation, Itachi." Orochimaru taunted, looking directly at Itachi. "This has been... amusing, to say the least."

Orochimaru brought his hand down.

A blinding flash of light flew out in all directions like a shockwave.

~~***~~

Madara didn't know what to think of that last attack.

He'd originally planned on having Itachi kill Orochimaru, dying in the process. A waste of a resource, true, but better to have Itachi die doing one last thing for Madara.

He'd watched from a safe distance, seeing that Itachi had made the first move, and appeared to hold the advantage, something that he'd always admired about the teen- he wasn't afraid to go all out against someone he knew had the potential to kill him.

Of course, that simply made it all the worse when Orochimaru started using something unheard of- manipulation of the elements themselves, beyond anything Shinobi were commonly capable of.

Yes, Madara mused from his new spot on the edge of the raincloud, waiting for the battle to start again, he'd definitely chosen the right time to have Orochimaru killed.

~~***~~

Orochimaru stood unharmed amongst the rubble that made up what used to be the crags and canyons surrounded by mesas. All around him, the land was vastly different from before- where once there were stretches of flat land were broken chunks of rock, and the mesas that so effectively hid the hideout were gone, the land leveled. Bringing his hand down, Orochimaru frowned at the melting skin that made up his right hand, flinging his wrist, sending the burned and sloughed skin flying into the rubble. Looking at his hand, much more colored than his own skin tone, he brought his hand and enclosed it, stabbing Kusanagi into the ground so he could focus entirely on regenerating the false skin that gave him his appearance. Feeling the skin of his left hand enclose around his right, he splayed his fingers to ensure that the new skin, that danced and rippled across his host body's skin, didn't become malformed. When he felt the rippling stop, he pulled back raising the fixed skin to his face, though he didn't stare at it.

"I never knew you were so _weak_ , Itachi." Orochimaru murmured, surveying the land through his Sharingan. "I was foolish to think you were the best host for me."

"Is that so?" The voice came from behind him, and he didn't even move as his body was rent in two by a single swing of Kusanagi, now in the possession of his opponent, who was showing the most emotion he ever would- anger, pure and simple. As the two halves of the snake Sannin fell apart, pythons flew out of both halves from the cut, meeting in the air and intertwining pulling the body into one, setting so that the bifurcation seemed to have never happened. "Then perhaps I should remind you why you were so foolish to go against me."

"Itachi, stealing my sword. I never knew you were so underhanded." Orochimaru admonished, standing up and watching the Uchiha amusedly. "Still, that was quite stupid of you." Before Itachi knew what was happening, Kusanagi had become a snake, dropping onto the Uchiha and extending to entangle the man's body. But just as the snake moved to give the finishing blow, Itachi had dissolved into the flock of ravens once more.

The ravens swirled around Orochimaru, who noticed that the sky was becoming blood-red, and he was being driven back. Before he knew what was going on, he was chained, all of his limbs connected to razor wire, yanking his arms and legs to their limits and digging into the skin.

_So this is Tsukiyomi..._

"Welcome to my world." The flock congregated, becoming the Uchiha once more- though this time he wore the black blade of his Mangekyo in his Sharingan. "For the next 72 hours, you will be subject to torture not even the Bloody Mist would deign to use." Orochimaru flared his Sharingan, and Itachi seemed to become incensed at that action. "Not even your stolen Sharingan can break out of this, no matter how evolved they are."

"Is that so?" Orochimaru mocked, using the same tone of voice Itachi had used earlier, before the Genjutsu world- and himself- shattered, revealing the real world once more. Spinning around, Itachi was met with the sight of a red-ringed atomic structure sitting in the eyes of his opponent, wielding Kusanagi once more. "Then perhaps I should remind you why _you_ were so foolish to go against me."

Black flames danced as Itachi was set ablaze.

KAFWOOSH!

The black flames were sent out as Itachi exploded into identical black flames, the two engulfing and consuming each other in the rain until nothing remained.

"Impressive. Creating an Exploding Clone out of the flames of Amaterasu. You truly are a genius." Orochimaru watched before he was engulfed in Amaterasu himself. However, instead of exploding like Itachi did, the snake Sannin simply crumbled into mud. From the far end of the newly created valley, Itachi stood, his eyes firmly pointed at the form until it fell apart. Tearing his eyes away, he finds a spear of Lightning Chakra heading right at him. Jumping back, he follows the spear back to the source: a grinning Orochimaru, who stepped out of the rubble that had encased him and stood, Kusanagi resting on his shoulder. Opening his mouth, he finished what his clone had begun to say. "But these eyes of mine are oh-so-special. I daresay they surpass yours."

Itachi said nothing, already feeling the affects of having used Amaterasu, his left eye having already begun to cry bloody tears. Closing both eyes, Itachi realized that he's about to waste all that he's got on this one last stand. He's used up all that he can afford to use to fight Orochimaru on what used to be equal footing, but is no longer the case. When the Sannin first tried to take over Itachi's body, he'd been easily beaten with little to no effort on the Uchiha's part, and now the role was reversed- Orochimaru had used what little effort he deigned to give the young prodigy in their battle and was pressing the advantage. He had no choice.

"Then I shall show you my trump card." Itachi spoke, opening both eyes, though not seeing anything but the vaguest of shapes- both his eyes had gone white with the encroaching darkness. Feeling the area, he pinpointed Orochimaru's location and moved towards it, his entire body screaming in pain as all of his cells were overwhelmed by the strain of keeping up his last technique of the Mangekyo- Susanoo. Stopping his movement towards the Sannin, he felt Susanoo's protective form waver as he starts coughing into his hand, filling it with a warm liquid that tasted metallic- blood. As the coughing fit stopped, he straightened up, ready to finish his task.

"Amazing." Orochimaru's breathless reply came not from ahead, but from directly behind him- within the confines of Susanoo. "I do hope your brother's body has the potential to withstand maintaining this being after I take your eyes."

_No! He was **ahead** of me!_

"H-how?" Itachi manages to get out before the strain gets to him, and he's soon coughing up more blood. Feeling the cold metal of Kusanagi on his neck, he can do nothing in those painful wracking coughs to fend the blade. Where had he gone _wrong?_ He should have been better than this- better than Orochimaru! He shouldn't have failed in killing that monster!

"As I said, dear Sasuke's eyes surpass yours." There was a pause, and Itachi idly wondered, as he fell to his knees, if his death will be short and painless or long and painful. "Or should I say, _my_ eyes surpass yours, Itachi. This has been one of the more exhilarating battles I've been in, possibly the only one where I actually had fun- that hasn't happened since I fought Sensei. Die knowing that privilege. Die knowing that I'll be using your eyes to surpass Madara and will achieve my goal."

There was a swing of a blade, and Itachi knew no more.


	22. The Man Who Would Be God

The rain cascaded down upon the battlefield, soaking the ground and turning what little dirt remained on the chunks of ground into mud, making the treacherous path deadly, as only the most skilled of Shinobi could cross that ground and not get caught in a slick patch of mud and fall into the jagged rocks that awaited to be covered in their blood.

Madara, for all his worth, had no reason to worry himself as he stooped over the dead body, his shadow darkening the corpse even further. Behind him stood a lone figure, watching with badly hidden amusement.

"I expected... more." Madara stared, activating his space/time jutsu and sending the body into the pocket dimension that was his and his alone to wield. Behind him, the figure shrugged.

"Did you expect anything less? He gave quite a fun workout, though." Madara barely noticed the figure's speech as the straightened up, keeping his masked face from showing to the figure behind him.

"Do you know what to do?" This time the figure's smirk was palpable in the air, and his laugh could be _felt_ by any within earshot.

"Of course." From the shadows, the serpentine face was revealed, it's eyes reverted back to the sickly yellow that almost glowed in the night. Within his grip was the dark hair of the head, having once been attached to the body that Madara had just whisked away. The face was contorted in pain, and the empty eye sockets slowly oozed what little blood had been drawn when the orbs had been removed. "When shall I attack mount the attack?"

"As soon as Zetsu reports."

~~***~~

The air was thin, despite the elevation having remained the same, and did well to spread the chill that it held with every inhale. Trudging across the land, unbidden from the cold, were armor-clad people, wearing full masks, making them identical in sight. They moved with purpose, and were found to circle around a compound, of sorts. The compound itself was nothing to behold, simply a large tower surrounded by a maze of halls, hiding the true nature of the labyrinthine complex hidden beneath the deceptively unassuming halls.

Within the main tower, five people sat at a curved table, with a sixth man flanked by two large men sitting behind a desk and facing into the curve. This man was quite old given his grayed hair and the deep lines that went down across his face from the bridge of his nose.

To the immediate left of him- and sitting at one end of the curved table- was a slender woman in a blue dress, her auburn hair hanging low over her face, hiding her right eye from view. In front of her was a angular hat with an indigo design on the front, the kanji for water on both it and the banner hanging behind her.

To her left was a tall man, the left side of his face hidden by a cloth that derived from the swath of bandages that encircled his head. He wore little else to disassociate him from a Jonin, save for the small cape that hung over his shoulders and reached midway to his elbow. Below his sole visible eye were a pair of tattoos that were similar to flames licking across his cheek. In front of him there was also an angular hat- like the rest of the people at the curved table- yet it's color was a sky blue and the kanji for wind was on both it and the banner behind him.

To his left- and in the middle of the table- was a large-chested woman, wearing a green coat over a sleeveless shirt. She had a purple diamond marking in the middle of her forehead, framing the few dirty-blond bangs that had escaped being wrangled into the twin ponytails. She shifted her eyes, watching those around her with something akin to trepidation. In front of her, the hat was red and both it and the banner had the kanji for fire upon them.

To her left was a small man in a green and yellow cloak with a red collar, bald and looking displeased at being there. He eyed the other occupants of the room in contempt. In front of him, the hat was an earthen brown and both it and the banner behind him had the kanji for earth on them.

Finally, capping the table, was a tall dark-skinned man. He wore but a cloak over his muscled chest, and around his wrists were bangle bracelets- golden in color and drawing attention to his midsection, where a large belt with the visage of a boar was engraved upon the buckle. He radiated tension, eying the others in the room in distaste, as if they weren't to be trusted. In front of him, his hat was yellow and the banner behind him held the kanji for lightning.

"This has not happened since the founding of the Hidden Villages." The man sitting across from the curved table spoke first. All eyes turned to him, including the ten individuals waiting in the balcony hidden by the banners. "I am Mifune, and shall be acting as moderator. Let the Gokage Summit commence."

~~***~~

The Raikage eyed his equals, sizing them up. He'd spent the better part of the past few years ensuring that both of Kumo's Jinchuuriki were safe from Akatsuki, and had heard the rumors that had spread throughout the Elemental Nations. At first he'd wondered if Suna was just grandstanding, blackballing a mercenary group to increase their own standing- and had almost laughed at the man's audacity.

Until the rumors began that Jinchuuriki were disappearing off of the face of the earth shortly after sightings of people wearing black cloaks pocked with red clouds.

Once they'd started, Ay had brought both of Kumo's Jinchuuriki- Nii Yugito, a ward of the Yotsuki clan, and his younger brother, Bee- into Kumo under full lockdown for nearly two years. He'd then had to listen to both his brother's incessant griping about musical repression while hearing reports of Suna asking for aid in locating their wayward Jinchuuriki, of Taki sending out their best to locate their own Jinchuuriki, of Kiri having been thrown into chaos from their Yondaime dying and releasing his Biju in battle against a member of Akatsuki. Two years of keeping Yugito and Bee in his sight at all times, fearing the day that Akatsuki would come after his brother and clan's ward. Two years of hearing nothing except the occasional reports of having spotted men wearing black cloaks with red clouds from all over the Elemental Nations. It had come to the point where he finally felt safe enough to let Bee go back to living in Unraikyo Pass, and Yugito returning to active duty- with at least one Jonin accompanying her at all times, of course (he kept the knowledge that those Jonin were required to make contact with Kumo both during and after the mission secret, knowing that his ward would have tried to kill him).

One year had passed since then, and Bee kept in contact regularly while Yugito kept returning from missions without harm. So he let down his guard a bit more, relaxing in the feeble hope that both had been safe from the might of Akatsuki.

But then Atsui hadn't made contact on a simple A-Rank mission to clear out one of their border supply buildings.

Which led to the revelation of finding two dead bodies- one barely recognizable except for the rags of a black cloak marked with red clouds, while the other was easily identified. Ay had had the misfortune of giving Samui the news of her brother's demise.

Ay had sent out word of a Gokage Summit, not wanting this injustice to go unpunished. If Akatsuki had survived this long, they had to have had the protection of a Hidden Village.

Looking over his so-called equals, he saw them as they were.

The Mizukage, keeping Kiri away from all other Hidden Villages. Keeping a neutral stance, perhaps, or hiding Akatsuki as they removed the Biju from their containers?

The Tsuchikage, an elderly man set in his ways, and too stubborn to step down. Perhaps he'd used Akatsuki to enforce the Shinobi of Iwa in ways he could no longer do?

The Hokage was someone he could at least respect a little, having kept the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki under lock and key since before the Akatsuki had started capturing Jinchuuriki. Or was Konoha lying, and they'd offered up the Kyuubi to ensure that they were exempt from the force of Akatsuki?

The Kazekage seemed to be the only person he would consider as being on his side, having brought the truth concerning Akatsuki to light, despite being too late to save the Ichibi from being taken. Or was he really covering up his tracks, hiding that Suna was in allegiance with Akatsuki?

Ay didn't know, but he intended to find out.

"Enough of this!" He yelled out, pounding the table- and creating a considerably large dent in it. "I have called this meeting to find out where you allegiances lie."

"Explain." Mifune commanded, and Ay had no trouble with that.

"Akatsuki how has seven of the Biju- they have been taking your Jinchuuriki from right under your noses and you've done nothing to stop them." Ay began. "I took the Kazekage's message seriously, and ensured that both of Kumo's Jinchuuriki were safe within Kumogakure while all of you did nothing to stop Akatsuki from running rampant. Only the Hokage has kept the Kyuubi safe, but can we really say that she has? Out of all of you, I only trust myself and my Shinobi. Prove to me that you are against such an organization when you've done _nothing_ to stop them. Done _nothing_ to find them, to kill off their members."

"You've got some nerve, boy." The Tsuchikage spoke up, looking at the tall man next to him. "You dare accuse us- the strongest of all the Hidden Villages- of going hiding Akatsuki?"

"My resources say that you, Tsuchikage, have employed Akatsuki many times in the past. Who's to say that you, any of you, didn't offer your Jinchuuriki to them in return for them sparing you from the might of all the Biju." Ay retorted, and Mifune stood.

"That's enough!" The room turned to look at him, and the Mizukage spoke up.

"I can prove that Kiri, at least, is against this Akatsuki." She leaned forward in her seat. "Yagura, our Yondaime Mizukage, was a Jinchuuriki himself. If we were with Akatsuki, would we really let him die in such a public way, instead of a more discrete method?"

"Konoha is against Akatsuki too." the Hokage said, shifting into a more relaxed position in her chair. "Our Jinchuuriki is safe, I assure you. His sanity is gone, yes." Here her voice cracked a little, but being the consummate professional they all were, she finished her sentence. "but he's quite safe."

"Suna has made our opinion of Akatsuki clear. I agree with both the Hokage and Mizukage." The Kazekage spoke up. "That makes four of the five Great Nations on your side." The occupants of the room looked at the Tsuchikage, who harrumphed and avoided eye contact.

"We are in an era of de-armament, and yet you still gather power." The Tsuchikage began. "Yes, I have employed Akatsuki in the past, but that is because all of you are calling for more power in a time when it is not needed. Akatsuki provided the power that Iwa needed while allowing it to continue thriving in this time.

"However," The Tsuchikage continued. "Iwa has since stopped dealing with Akatsuki. We've made attempts to retrieve our Jinchuuriki since their disappearance, but we have done so in secret. Whether or not you are capable of keeping your Jinchuuriki is an internal matter. To bring another Hidden Village into the matter is the subject of great shame to both you and your village."

"Shaddup, you old goat!" An elderly woman shouted down to him from above the Kazekage. For his part, he looked irked and simply shook his head.

"I apologize. Chiyo has become... unique in her old age." Baki said, louder than necessary, as though speaking to both the Tsuchikage and the elderly Chiyo in the balcony above. "She would do well to remember her position right now."

"I'll respect you when I'm dead! Onoki's wrong and all of you know it!" Chiyo answered, before a softer woman's voice could be heard along with a huff.

"As I said, she's become... unique in her old age." Baki sheepishly said, causing both the Mizukage and Hokage to stifle their laughter, something that didn't go unheard of in the balcony.

"Act your age, Tsunade-Shisho!" a young woman's voice came from behind the Hokage, who immediately sobered up.

"Your escort is right, Tsunade." Ay said, bringing the meeting back on topic. "We are not here to discuss the actions of our more elderly Shinobi, we are here to discuss the plan of action against Akatsuki. Seeing as Konoha still has the Kyuubi, you would do well to remember your standing amongst us."

"He has a point." the Mizukage spoke up. "Both you and Raikage have one Jinchuuriki in your possession, while the rest of the Elemental Nations does not. That makes both of you the stronger forces should our Countries come to war."

"Then what do you suggest?" Tsunade retorted, shifting into a more professional position on her seat. The Mizukage looked to the side, as if unsure if she should divulge such information.

"There were rumors of the Yondaime Mizukage, Yagura, being controlled by Akatsuki. The current story circulating through Kiri is that he died to escape his control."

"Where are you going with this?" Ay queried, crossing his arms as he gazed guardedly at her.

"I'm simply stating that Yagura, who was rumored at being one of the few who had complete control over his Biju was helpless against Akatsuki, how would any of us fare, should we be attacked?"

"A fine question." A voice said from the shadow of the hallway, before revealing itself as a man, long orange hair tied in a ponytail. His face had black piercings in it, prominently a bar running through his upper nose and attached to a pair of circular studs stemming from his cheeks. On his forehead was a Hitai-Ate bearing the five lines of Ame, with a long slash running from end to end. The man's eyes were gray, and held odd pupils that had concentric rings running away from them, almost like ripples in a pond. But the most prominent feature of the man was the black cloak marked with red clouds that he wore. "One that I intend to answer."

Suddenly the five Kage were protected by ten individuals, each in pairs and standing before their respective Kage. In front of the Raikage, who was closest to the Akatsuki member, were a pair of men, opposites as much as they could be. The first was wielding a large sword, his dark skin made darker from the shaggy white hair that cascaded down to cover the left side of his face. The second was quite tanned, but held himself more seriously than his colleague, despite having no weapon of his own.

"Who are you?" Mifune asked, also standing from his seat. However, his question was drowned out by the voice of one of the Hokage's escorts.

"Nagato?" Jiraiya stepped forward, looking at the man in horror. "No, you can't be him."

"Nagato?" The man himself seemed to ponder the name before holding out his hands. "Now _there_ was a man..."

Suddenly, the room was filled with smoke and the sound of several things being summoned. The smoke was short-lived, however, as the younger of Baki's escorts gave a single swing of her massive fan, sending it flying down the hallway behind the now half-dozen men standing before them. All of them bore the slashed Hitai-Ate signifying a once-allegiance to Amegakure; all of them- save one- bearing the same shade of orange hair; all of them wearing the red-and-black cloaks of Akatsuki.

All of them bearing the same eyes.

"Not possible..." Jiraiya spoke first, breaking the silence that followed the revelation. "Only Nagato had the Rinnegan." His face hardened. "Who are you? Where did you get those eyes?"

"I am Pein, and I am god." All of them spoke at once, drawing Jiraiya's eyes to the one that seemed to take the lead, raising his arms towards all of them.

_No...!_

"Shinra Tensei."

~~***~~

In the far edge of the complex, a squad of the armor-clad individuals, led by a man identical to them, save for the horns atop his helmet, were engaged in combat with a blue-haired woman, if she could be called that. This woman had the head and torso to suggest that she was a normal person, while the rest of her body was breaking away into hundreds of sheets of paper, folding in the air to create Shuriken, Kunai, and several other similar weapons. The leader unsheathed his swords, running chakra through them and slicing through the first wave, thinking that the woman was at the disadvantage, had she not dissolved into paper completely, the sheets overwhelming the squad, sliding into their masks and covering their mouths and noses. The squad dropped their swords and clawed at their faces, several trying to remove their masks only to find their bodies being bound by the sheets, forming formless bodies that squirmed on the floor for several minutes before going still. The sheets broke away from the bodies, forming the woman once more, and she stood in the middle of the room, acting as though such a thing was commonplace.

The only noticeable trait to be found of her was the look of regret she had for having killed the squad.

_Is this what peace looks like...?_

~~***~~

Ay broke out of the rubble using his Lightning Armor, Darui and C close to him, and looked around. The once-elegant room was nothing more than empty space, with rubble coating the floor, leading back to the epicenter- the lanky orange-haired Akatsuki member, who simply lowered his arms and stood by as the five others near-identical to him spread throughout the room, moving to intercept the Kage and their escorts, who immediately engaged this "Pein" in combat. The Raikage found himself engaged in combat with a giant winged dog, having a large black spike piercing the roof of it's mouth. The beast easily charged towards him, encompassing a large amount of the room they were in. Jumping in the air, he brought his right leg, covered in his Lightning Armor, down on top of the beast's head, splitting it in half easily.

Too easily, he found out, as the dog split into two, one attacking him while the second went after Darui, who dispatched it with a simple Storm Release attack...

Only for _that_ dog to split into two, dazed as they were.

_How!_

Moving quickly, A dodged the dog that was preoccupied with him to deliver a deadly blow to the mutt, hacking off it's head, ending the beast's reign. Suddenly, the other two were howling, staggering blindly, slamming into the columns before dispersing. Ay narrowed his eyes at the revelation.

_A Summons..._

Of course, he had little time to ponder that type of Summons when a similarly giant, freakish bird drilled it's beak into him. It had three wings and a trio of legs, as though it was once two different birds that were forcibly blended together. Ay simply chose to take the attack head-on, punching through the beak, shattering it. As he did so, he noticed in the split second before it was unsummoned that it had the same eyes as those Akatsuki members.

"Interesting." A voice came from above, revealing the man that had summoned the others on one of the columns. "Never has someone singlehandedly taken down two of my Summons so easily. Perhaps I misjudged-" Whatever the man was about to say was stopped when A slammed his foot into the man, nearly crushing the column- but killing the Summoner. Of course, just as soon as he'd done that, Ay was launched back by a single attack from that short-haired one- the de facto leader, it seemed.

As he pulled himself out of the crater caused by that repulsion attack, he watched as the leader pulled out these strange black rods and engaged Darui in battle. All around him, he saw the different battles playing out, and wondered just what they were up against.

~~***~~

Baki stood across from his opponent with Jiraiya, Tsunade, Temari, Chiyo and Tsunade's aid engaging another of these "Pein". The man they were facing was loose, long orange hair. The most standout of his piercings- as all of these people that called themselves "Pein" had- was the diagonal bar running through his nose. He stood there, two of those rods in his hands, wielding them like swords.

"Who are you?" Jiraiya asked, already prepping for his own attack- a Fire Release, most likely, that Baki could augment with a Wind Release jutsu.

"We are Pein." The man's monotonous voice answered again. "I have already told you this, Jiraiya. Why do you keep asking me that?" He cocked his head to the side, ignoring the howling of the massive dogs on the other side of the area. Jiraiya stopped his hand seals, slapping them together as he was engulfed in a cloud of smoke. The man seemed to sigh, before launching forward, inside of Baki's defenses and piercing him with both rods- one in the torso and the other in the shoulder, due to a well-executed parry.

_Now I- urk!_

Baki tried to mold his chakra into a Blade of Wind to finish off his opponent only to find that it was being overrode by a foreign source emanating from the rods. Pushing the man away before he could reveal what unholy power he had, Baki reached with his one good arm and yanked the rod in his shoulder out before gripping the one under his ribs with both hands and pulling it out in one fell swoop. Dropping both rods- which were unnaturally warm to the touch- he looked around warily for his opponent, before he felt a hand connect with his head, stalling all his bodily movement. His arms dropped down to his sides, though he didn't notice it, his eyes staring sightlessly out, an ethereal blue-white glow coming from his head and surrounding the hand of the Pein he'd been fighting.

In front of him, through the smoke, a long, tendril-like creature shot out at the Pein, who jumped back away, yanking the blue-white substance with him, revealing itself as having the form of a human. As soon as the form was completely detached, Baki's body fell to the ground, his visible eye now glassy. In the hand of Pein, the human form dissipated into nothing, leaving his hands free to be occupied with another pair of those black rods while the tendril curved to wrap around him. Within seconds of being tied down, a jet of water shot out of the smoke, emanating from the same source as the tendril. However, before it could reach the Pein, a second orange-haired man, this one having short hair tied into a tiny ponytail, spike studs adorning his cheeks. Holding his arms out, a sphere encompassed him, absorbing the jet mere feet before it could hit either Pein. The jet held out for several more seconds before it stopped. Moving both his hands, he gripped the tendril-like object, yanking it's source out of the smoke before ripping it apart. A screeching sound was heard once the tendril was torn, spilling blood from both ends as the remaining half of it retracted into the mouth of a small Toad Summons. The Summons itself was connected to the left shoulder of Jiraiya, whose appearance had changed drastically. The entirety of both cheeks, spreading out in a triangular shape from the nose, were red, while he'd grown a small beard on his chin. His nose was now bulbous, having changed shape like both his hands- where the fingers were considerably longer and lacked fingernails. His eyes, though, were what drew the most attention- having changed into a now glowing amber with rectangular pupils.

"You okay, Ma?" Jiraiya asked, looking over at his left shoulder. The Summons simply spat out a mouthful of blood, it's torn tongue resting inside it's mouth. The toad nodded, and the trio faced both men, who simply watched them with interest.

"How odd." The short-haired one spoke, and the long-haired one picked up where he left off, speaking in the same voice. "What technique is this?"

"That," Jiraiya grinned, as the toad on his right shoulder puffed out it's cheeks. "Would be telling."

The toad expelled a tidal wave of a dark oil, which was soon ignited in a brilliant display of coordination, and the tidal wave of fire crashed down upon the ground, seemingly engulfing both figures. Keeping his face impassive, Jiraiya wasted no time in preparing for the next attack, as the flames quickly died down as they appeared to be sucked into the spherical vortex that emanated from the short-haired Pein and protected both from the flames. Slamming both hands down, the ground beneath the two- and around the sphere- shifted into a swamp-like substance that consumed the rubble that stood upon it. Shifting his torso forward, Jiraiya's hair became much more shaggy, turning into sharp spikes that began launching themselves at the pair.

"Shinra Tensei."

Those two words soon became the bane of all present, as a giant panda, bearing the same eyes as Pein, appeared to take the hit before it was sent barreling into the sage. The split second before it could, though, Tsunade and A before Jiraiya, both reaching out and punching the panda, bifurcating it in a spectacular display of strength. Both halves flew back and into the far end of the impromptu atrium, where they smashed into and through yet another wall, exposing the chilling outside to the people inside.

As Jiraiya straightened up, he was flanked by several people: Darui, Ay and Tsunade. Behind him, both of the Kazekage's escorts were standing over their leader's body, mourning his death before the elderly woman stepped forth.

"What do you know of him." Chiyo asked, pulling out a scroll with the numbers 1 through 10 emblazoned upon several seals. Jiraiya laid his hand on her shoulder, stopping the motion to unseal the objects. She glared up at him before he shook his head in the negative.

"The lead was a student of mine." He began, speaking loud enough for all of them to hear. "His name was Yahiko, though he didn't have the eyes of another student of mine."

"Then Konoha is not to be trusted." Ay said, standing a distance away from the six men gathered together in a circle, watching the people surrounding them with a fair amount of interest. Jiraiya shook his head.

"Yes, we are." He argued, the two toads on his shoulders remaining silent, their hands placed together and oblivious to the world around them.

"You taught the leader of Akatsuki." Ay reasoned. "Therefore you are not to be trusted. Who knows what other secrets you're hiding behind those walls of yours."

"We are not allied with any Hidden Village." The lead Pein spoke, stepping forward and facing the group. "Akatsuki seeks the Biju to bring peace. Give us the location of the Hachibi and we will leave you alive."

"I don't think so." An aged voice spoke from above, revealing Onoki, the Tsuchikage, floating high above them, a tiny conical shape within his outstretched hands, which exploded towards Pein in a singular burst of blinding chakra. The lead Pein, for his part, simply held both hands above his head while he was surrounded by the rest of the orange-haired Pein, and spoke two single words.

"Shinra Tensei."

The explosion took out the rest of the complex, leaving the Kage and the escorts out in the cold, the wind blowing snow into them and obscuring visibility. All around the six men, Shinobi and Samurai alike were pulling themselves out of the rubble of the building. The battered Shinobi all watched as, at once, all six of them spoke up.

"We are the Six Paths of Pein, and we are-"

**KABOOM!**

A massive beam of condensed chakra hit all six men at once, obliterating them from existence in mere seconds. Of the group, only those of Kumo and Iwa recognized the attack used to destroy the six men that they could not.

"Not possible..." Onoki spoke, turning his head to see the eight figures that stood on top a crag, watching all of them. Suddenly, one of figures shouted to the Kage.

"Hold on, we'll be down to help with the injured in a minute!"

The eight figures disappeared from the crag, reappearing on the edge of the rubble before spreading out, with only three moving towards the Shinobi. The Shinobi could only watch, dumbfounded, as the three forms became clear as day. All around them, the Samurai were seen being helped up by the five other figures, several of which used the rubble to create copies to aid in rescuing the injured, but none of the Kage or their escorts noticed this, instead focusing on the trio moving towards them.

"So, how's things?" Uzumaki Naruto asked, a ravenous grin on his face.


	23. Divide

The wind blew hard, sending the plumes of smoke and dust into the falling snow, creating a sort of ash that dulled everything it came into contact with into shades of gray. All around the Shinobi, clones of each of those individuals, including the majority of the original group, were spread out, moving through the rubble of the main complex with the Samurai to rescue their injured comrades. However, they saw none of this, only focusing on the fact that every person in that group should have been dead.

"Yugito?" Darui speaks up, staring in awe at the dirty-blond. "How? You- We thought you were dead."

"Ask them." She jerks her thumb at Naruto and Utakata, who are talking with the Kage and healing the wounded, respectively. Darui turned to Utakata, who was closer- and had just healed his arm.

"But I'm asking you." He waves his healed arm towards Yugito, who sighs. Finishing wrapping the gauze around the broken arm of one of the Samurai, she turned to the man who'd always had a crush on her.

"And I'm _telling_ you that I don't know the specifics of my rescue. After Atsui..." She gazed to the ground forlornly. Darui, acting prudent towards her feelings, remained quiet, watching her intently. "Look, I went all out on those two, but they just wouldn't _die_. That one guy got me the same as he did Atsui. I'm lucky to be alive right now." Yugito trailed off, wrapping her arms around herself as she remembered the pain of being stabbed by nothing, which overlaid with her memory of watching Atsui go through the same thing. "There was nothing I could do. They were too strong. There was nothing I could do..."

Suddenly, a pair of dark-skinned, muscled arms wrapped around her, encompassing her in warmth, and Yugito knew that this was a man she could confide in, could trust to comfort her when she needed comforting.

~~***~~

Nearby, Utakata seethed, gazing at the sight of Yugito cuddling up with that Kumo-nin- Darui. He was so caught up in his internal ruminations that he barely noticed that the green healing chakra was beginning to boil and bubble, resulting in him nearly eviscerating the Iwa-nin he was healing. However, before his acidic Yokai could even begin to touch the teenage girl, his arm found itself in the unrelenting grip of her uncle- Han. Squeezing the limb, the sudden pain brought Utakata's focus back to the matter at hand.

"I would prefer if you didn't harm my niece." Han intoned, leaving little to the imagination what he would do if the girl was inadvertently injured. Grimacing, Utakata cut off the supply of Yokai coursing through his hand before starting it up in his other hand, solid green and calm, which was lowered down onto the girl's cracked ribs, healing the damage done.

"Sorry." He apologized, finishing up the healing and moving the wake the teen- Kurotsuchi, he realized. Han's niece. Glancing back towards the embracing pair, he audibly growled for several seconds, his entire form almost _vibrating_ , until Han's not-so-silent laughter made him aware of his actions. Turning away from the giant, he started brooding- the manly version of pouting. Gesturing towards the pair he spoke his troubles. "That."

"It bothers you." It wasn't a question.

"Yes." Utakata ground out, teeth gnashing together.

"Then go to her." Han's simple statement brought Utakata out of his brooding funk, and he looked askance at the gentile giant. "Simply standing to the side when she's obviously hurting is not good for your relationship. Being there for her when she needs it most is the best thing you can do- for the both of you." Utakata could do nothing but agree to that statement, and not for the first time wondered where the man had learned that piece of sagely wisdom- from what he understood, Han was not sociable before joining the group, which had most of the group in the dust about where he learned so much about relationships.

The fact that Roshi broke down laughing every time they turned to him for answers didn't help.

Sighing- with more than a hint of malice- Utakata took one last look over the injured, who were healed up quite nicely and now were resting to restore their energy, before moving towards the pair, the tension in his body visibly increasing with each step.

Blinking, Han concluding that the situation was out of his hands, and looked over his niece, who was dozing peacefully before him. Out of his entire family, he was only on the best of terms with Roshi, and that was only because of the both of them having to train in using their Biju's Yokai. Which was why it was such a surprise when he took to scaring the living daylights out of Kitsuchi, Onoki's son and future husband of Han's sister, Tokine. Of course, if anyone other than Roshi had asked him why he'd impressed an irrational fear of the man upon first contact (which they did), he'd just give the person or persons asking a hard, unrelenting stare until they backed down.

Hell, he even got Onoki to back down! That had to mean _something_?

But the truth was, he actually had a bit of a mean streak, particularly when it had to involve practical jokes on his family. Doubly so when it involved the _reaction_ of his family during and after those jokes. Still, for all that he was amicable in private, he never really got to know any one of his family outside of Roshi.

Reaching down and pulling the bangs from her eyes, Han chose to change from that point. He'd get to know his family, really know them, just to show that he wasn't all that he seemed.

~~***~~

Naruto stood there, grinning like a madman, while staring down the two people he'd once trusted with his life. The two people he'd have taken a Kunai for.

The two people who'd betrayed him.

Sure, his life as both a civilian and ninja was a good as could be, but he'd dearly wished that he'd had someone there to care for him, to be the person there to greet him when he came home from the academy, to console him when he cried, to help explain the things to him that others couldn't. To be the parent he'd wanted _so much_.

When he was younger, he'd once had a phase where he wanted to know who his parents were- understandable, for an orphan. The closest he'd come to an answer was that most of the kids growing up around him in the orphanage didn't know their parents, nor did the faculty know who the mothers and fathers were either. It often happened in a ninja society- sometimes Kunoichi got pregnant and, fearing the end of their career, carried the baby to term before leaving it in the care of the village. Of course, Naruto had contested this by saying that he had been brought there with a last name, something that not many of the other kids had had. The matron had then told him that was because they were children whose mothers were known, and had died from birthing complications, so they were given their mother's family name in remembrance of her. She then said that Naruto's father was probably a Shinobi that had died in the last days of the Third Great Shinobi World War, which was the story for many of his age-mates. So Naruto had left it at that, and had gone on to become a Shinobi.

Which brought him back to the matter at hand- or rather, the pair of Shinobi standing before him.

"Naruto..." Tsunade was holding back tears, if her cracked voice was any indication, and she attempted to pull him into a hug- which he barely dodged. Stepping towards the Raikage, Naruto held out his hand in greetings before introducing himself.

"Uzumaki Naruto, Kyuubi Jinchuuriki. It's nice to finally meet you. Yugito spoke highly of both you and your brother." Naruto's smile suddenly became much less ravenous, and more of a respectful turning of the lips. The Raikage just stood there, staring at both the teen, leaving the outstretched hand alone in the attempt to befriend the man. The seconds stretched on, raising the tension in the air until Naruto curled his hand into a fist and dropped his arm to hang loosely by his side. Chuckling, Naruto nervously scratched the back of his head, failing to keep up his professionalism in the face of such an imposing man. "Sorry about that. I get kinda forward when-"

" _You_ are the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki." The Raikage interrupted, looking Naruto in the eye. Flinching slightly, Naruto nodded, the smile fading from his lips. "I was under the impression that you were insane." Naruto twitched at that barb, but said nothing. The Raikage hummed in thought, looking the blond over once more, before continuing. "However, you appear quite sane to me. Furthermore, you do not appear to have been in Konoha under lock and key, as the Hokage has repeatedly assured us."

"Well, you can't believe everything you hear." Naruto demurely answered, following the Raikage's gaze at Tsunade, who looked ashamed and glanced away. Naruto continued. " _Especially_ anything from Konoha."

"You don't sound like you're on good terms with your village." Mei stepped in, having come over after looking Yagura over for any sign of being under Genjutsu. Naruto shrugged, looking at the Godaime Mizukage from the corner of his eye before answering.

"I was removed from the ninja ranks and banished. They're not my village." Naruto stated, and Tsunade stepped in, angry at having to defend her actions.

"You'd snapped. You were violent, attacking anyone you saw physically, and when you couldn't do that, you verbally condemned them- and yourself." Here Naruto looked ashamed, gazing down at his feet. "I did everything I could do- _nothing_ worked. We couldn't lock you up since we had nothing we could use to withstand the possibility of you drawing on the Kyuubi. Your actions clearly said that you couldn't be allowed to roam freely in just about any capacity, so an open banishment was set in store.

"The plan was for Jiraiya to seal off your chakra, which he figured would snap you back to normal. A squad of ANBU were sent to leave you near the border with predetermined things like clothes, a map of the area, and some Kunai. Jiraiya figured that you would stumble on the trade route and hitch a ride into the nearby town, where he was waiting." Tsunade waved at the man in question, her voice having regained it's steadiness. "If you were back to normal, he'd find you and contact me. He'd take you with him for a few weeks before I'd call him- and you- back. If you were still the same, he'd..." She took a deep breath to steady her voice again, having broken during that last sentence. "Anyway, when you didn't show, he went out to find you himself, hoping that you'd hopped on an outgoing caravan away from the city. When he didn't find you, and Akatsuki had been reported in the area, we'd assumed the worst." She stopped talking, aware of the problems inherent with what she just revealed and what the Elemental Nations had been told.

"The official statement was that he'd snapped during one of his missions, and had to be restrained indefinitely." Jiraiya picked up where she left off, something she appeared grateful for. "This wasn't something that's ever happened before. There was no precedent-"

"There was, you just never had to deal with it." Yagura interrupted, bringing the conversation careening towards him. "He was a Child, and there wasn't a thing about them-"

"He was a Shinobi, and neither of the previous Jinchuuriki had any problems." Jiraiya retorted, glaring at the tiny man.

"Because your Shodai was alive to prevent the connection from being made with the previous Children!" Yagura shouted, and suddenly all Shinobi not of Konoha suddenly understood the situation.

"Then we have to kill him." The Raikage spoke up suddenly, raising his fist at the blond, who was immediately surrounded by all of the other Jinchuuriki- Yugito included.

"No." She spoke, almost daring him to try something. "He isn't like the stories."

"I don't have the connection anymore." Naruto spoke up, drawing the attention of all present- excluding Yagura. Mei shook her head, stepping forth.

"Once a Child, always a Child." She said, sounding regretful. "All Kekkei Genkai clans borne of a Child in Kiri sought to sever the connection, though all attempts ended in death. It wasn't until the third clan to nearly wipe itself out that it was declared impossible. Not even my clans- both from my mother and from my father- could successfully sever the connection and not die."

"What connection?" Jiraiya spoke up, and his extra features disappeared as both toads detached from his shoulders, also rather curious about the situation.

"And what are these Children you keep speaking of?" the one from Jiraiya's right shoulder asked, sounding like an old man.

"Children of Jinchuuriki." Naruto spoke up, bringing attention back to him. "When a Jinchuuriki has a child, that child has a connection to the Biju held within their parent. They develop a Kekkei Genkai, too, though it usually results in those special elemental jutsu."

"What?" Tsunade spoke again, watching all of them. "But that's not possible. Only my grandfather had Wood Release, and he wasn't related to a Jinchuuriki. My father didn't display any sign of a Kekkei Genkai, so that can't be right."

"But your grandfather was the Senju Hashirama." Yagura said, as though that might explain everything. When he saw her still-confused face, however, he amended that thought and elaborated. "Your grandfather could control the Biju and suppress their Yokai- demonic chakra." He explained, inwardly wondering just _how_ Konoha was considered the most powerful Hidden Village if it didn't even know any of this. "Because you're related to him, your chakra has properties similar to his. Your father, as a result, didn't have that connection, so he wasn't a Child."

"But that still doesn't explain Naruto-boy's problem." the toad from the left shoulder said, sounding like an elderly woman. Yagura sighed, and looked to the Raikage for that answer.

"When a Child figures out to draw on their Biju's Yokai, it puts a strain on the parent. That's mostly because the Biju's trying to get out of the parent and into the Child. We had one Jinchuuriki die from the strain, and we were unable to get the Biju out in time. However, the Child could still use the Biju's Yokai, and kept using it until-" He took a deep breath, as though calming himself. "Please know that this is just a second-hand account, I don't know the specifics. But, one day, the Child became overloaded with Yokai, and suddenly, standing above the body of the Child was the Nibi- the Biju that had died with the parent. Kumo was able to subdue it and seal it again, but when we sent the Child's body into autopsy, the medics' report said that there were massive chakra burns throughout the entire chakra system, particularly through the navel- and in the rough shape of the seal that the parent had on her."

"How does that explain Naruto-boy's situation?" the elderly male toad asked, looking lost. Yagura spoke up once more to pick up the slack.

"When a Child reaches the state of using the one-tailed cloak, they lose their minds. All research into the subject said that it was temporary, and so the elders of Kiri thought nothing of it until a Child reached it and slaughtered everyone and everything in sight. She had to be killed and the Sanbi resealed, after study showed that the insanity was permanent." Yagura finished. " _That's_ what happened to Naruto."

"And your ploy of sealing my chakra worked." Naruto added. "But Yagura thinks it was mostly Namikaze's work in sealing half of Kyuubi with him in the Shinigami that had it only temporary."

"But that also left Naruto weaker. With only half a Biju within him, he couldn't fully work with Kyuubi's Yokai as well as he should have."

"So we sold my connection to Kyuubi to the Shinigami in order to get back the missing half." Naruto bluntly stated, causing half of the Shinobi present to clutch their chests and arms in shock. "It agreed too. Said it would love to study how a mortal could be connected to 'one of the Nine', or something like that. Can't remember what he said exactly..." Naruto trailed off, shuddering in remembrance of his meeting with the Shinigami. "I'm just glad that's the last I'll see of it until I die."

"Did it work, then?" Mei asked, looking hopeful at the teen, who shrugged.

"Wouldn't be here if it didn't." Naruto replied.

"Moving back on topic." Yagura interjected, bringing everyone's attention to him. "There's still the question of how this attack fits into Akatsuki's plan."

"Without the Biju in their possession, Akatsuki is noticeably less powerful than they would have to be to launch an attack on the Kage and succeed." A mused. "It wouldn't be too hard to ally together and create a strike force."

"No." Yagura stopped that line of thought before it could get too far. "This was obviously planned. Most likely this attack was to send a message to us." He gestured to the group standing around him. "Akatsuki _needs_ the Biju to complete their plans. Madara wouldn't order an attack like this if it didn't fit into his plans."

"Madara?" Onoki looked at the former Mizukage closely. "Uchiha Madara?"

"Who do you think was controlling me?" Yagura asked Mei, and the Shinobi erupted in an uproar.

"Not possible. He's dead!" Onoki shouted, his sentiments shared by those around him. Naruto was given a minute nod from Yagura and Roshi, before all the Shinobi present were subjected to a very focused pressure, though the amount wavered slightly. Quieting down, they found that Naruto seemed to be straining with something, and each time he almost lost concentration the focused intent let up a bit.

"That's enough Naruto. Thank you." Yagura said, and the teen sighed, slumping up against Fu, who held him close and shifted so that Han could share in holding the beleaguered teen upright. Utakata shifted next to the teen, running a healing diagnostic on him before slapping Naruto awake. Yagura cleared his throat and said his due diligence. "Madara is still alive. Knowing this, a strike force would be ineffective against the man." He held up his hand to quell any prospect of talking. "However, Ay's idea of an alliance does hold merit."

"Nothing less than all of our forces combined would be enough to take down that monster for good." Onoki added, making Yagura nod in approval.

"Precisely. Which is why I propose that all of you join forces." Yagura finished.

"I don't trust that they won't plan something against any of us." Ay said, motioning to the other Shinobi. Yagura nodded.

"Which is why this alliance is only this one time. Once Madara is well and truly dead, all of you take your Shinobi back to your Hidden Villages."

"What about you?" Jiraiya spoke up. "You keep saying 'your Shinobi' and 'your Hidden Villages'. If we _are_ to take down Akatsuki then what will all of you do? Since none of you have returned to your Hidden Village after all this time, you'd be considered missing-nin. If we're in this alliance, so are you."

"He has a point." Roshi said, having taken over for Han in keeping the semi-lucid upright.

"Which is why we'll go with you when you return to your Hidden Villages." Yagura said diplomatically. Raising his hand- and letting out his own intent on all in the area- he continued. "Akatsuki hasn't seen us since saving Yugito, so a public display of us back in our home villages would draw Madara and his subordinates out of the shadows. Also, we'll be on hand to ensure that none of the Hidden Villages prepare anything against their colleagues." Naruto's only response was a bemoaning set of disgruntled mutters, while the Shinobi were watching with interest.

"I'm not going back to Taki." Fu suddenly declared, drawing all eyes on her. "My life's been so much more than it ever could before I left. I'm not going back." Yagura sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Thankfully, Tsunade solved that problem for him.

"You're free to come with us back to Konoha. I don't think Naruto would mind." The blond in question ceased his muttering, opting instead for an exasperated look at Yagura, who ignored it.

"I presume that you will be leading this Alliance?" Mei asked, looking at Yagura pointedly. The man shook his head in the negative.

"I'm retired." He answered. "Also, I'm not looking to lead anyone."

She quirked an eyebrow, shifting her gaze from him to the group of Jinchuuriki behind him.

"We're a democracy." Yagura answered her unspoken question. "And Ay will be leading the Alliance."

"What?" Onoki growled, and Chiyo hit him upside the head.

"Shaddup you old coot. Out of all of us, he's the best qualified. Our Kazekage's dead, and I'm just acting Kazekage until it's made official when we get back to Suna. Tsunade lied about the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki, and she's too hot-headed to lead properly. You're too old, and admitted to having used Akatsuki before, so your judgment's compromised. As for the Mizukage, she's not experienced enough to lead an army of that size. The Raikage was the only one of us who was prudent about keeping Kumo's Jinchuuriki safe from Akatsuki and is the most level-headed of us. Not to mention he's got enough experience to properly lead such a massive army, and more than enough determination for it to succeed."

"Then it's settled." Yagura said. "We'll go with you back to your Hidden Villages before heading out to the Land of Lightning in a week's time."


	24. Journey

"So..." Temari looked anywhere but at the sole male of the trio, passing through the trees of the Land of Fire, moving directly towards the Land of Wind and Suna. "How are you?" She awkwardly tried to start conversation with her youngest brother- the same one that had been deemed deceased by their late Sensei.

"I am fine." Gaara answered, not breaking his concentration on the path ahead. "Yourself?"

"Fine." She repeated in disbelief. "Fine? You disappear to god knows where and all you have to say is 'fine'? No 'I missed you'? No 'I nearly died and was in a position where I couldn't return'?"

"No." Gaara turned his head to look at Temari askance. "My current disposition can best be defined as 'fine'. My travels, however, are not something I shall divulge."

"He's got you there, Missy!" Chiyo called back from her spot in the formation. "But she has a point, kid. Suna worked its' butt off trying to find you, some respect is expected."

"I apologize." Gaara told the elderly woman, glancing in her direction. "I was unaware of such actions. I hope I didn't cause any undue harm to the ninja force of Suna."

Chiyo harrumphed and didn't say anything more. They traveled in silence for several more minutes until Gaara spoke up.

"With the Kazekage dead, who will step up as leader of Suna and take part in the Alliance?" Temari gaped at him, shocked that he looked and sounded so, so... _normal_. If she hadn't known him before his disappearance, she'd have sworn that the young man moving through the trees beside her was a simple Chunin or fresh Jonin, not her homicidal Jinchuuriki brother.

"Me." Chiyo answered. Gaara quirked an eyebrow up in curiosity and Chiyo answered the unasked question. "Because of the economic depression all those years ago, there were few, if any, Suna-Nin capable of holding the title of Kazekage. The only ones that are qualified are me, my brother and your siblings."

"That still does not answer my question." Gaara stated, watching the woman intently. She sighed.

"Kankuro, however skilled he is in puppetry, isn't a leader. The same can be said of my brother." Chiyo landed in a small grove to briefly rest. The two siblings hit the ground behind her, and she turned to look at the two. "Temari, while smart and powerful, isn't experienced enough to handle being Kazekage."

"While you have the experience, the power and the mind to lead." Gaara supplied, nodding to himself. "Interesting. Does this mean that I'll be labeled as a missing-nin, since I am neither dead nor retired?"

"Neither." Chiyo laughed. "You're still listed as dead. No amount of politics can change that."

"Of course." Gaara distractedly murmured to himself. "And because of that, I am free to enter and exit Suna as I wish."

"Yes." Chiyo frowned as she agreed, watching the red-haired Jinchuuriki closely. "But you won't."

"Wrong." Gaara argued. "I will when we leave for the Land of Lightning. Whether I return after the war or not is of no concern to you, Rokudaime Kazekage."

"And that's where _you_ are wrong, boy." Chiyo growled, facing the teen. Off to the side, Temari moved to the edge of the grove, tripping over an old, overgrown mound of the ground reminiscent of a firepit. Glancing around the area, she could see the telltale signs of the grove having been a campsite many years ago before bringing her attention back to the two in front of her. "Seeing as Shukaku is the property of Suna, whether you return _is_ my concern. You _will_ be returning to Suna with me when all this is said and done."

"Shukaku is not the property of anyone." Gaara contested, his black sand leaving his gourd to form a protective circle in the air around him. "I shall go wherever I please, irregardless of any pact made during the formation of the Hidden Villages regarding the Biju."

"No you will not." Chiyo glared at him, but he was unfazed. "You are a Shinobi serving under the Kazekage, and you will return to Suna after the war. That is an order."

Gaara just stared at her, blinking slowly. He said a single sentence before jumping into the trees towards the Land of Wind- and Suna.

"How can I serve you when I am listed as dead?"

~~***~~

Yugito sighed, ignoring Darui's unsubtle attempts at flirting with her, and instead focused on C and the Raikage.

"I'm sorry." She blurted, stopping their trek through the mountains. "I didn't return when once I was healed, nor was I strong enough to get away from Akatsuki. I'm sorry."

A simply stared at her, while C blushed and looked away, suddenly very interested in the far off mountains. Yugito stood there, knowing that Darui had been shocked into silence and figuring that he was just standing behind her, mouth agape at what she'd just said. It was an odd feeling, wanting to snicker at Darui's expression while the urge to cower before A was being forcibly repressed.

"It's alright." A spoke, breaking the tension and drawing all eyes on him. Turning on his heel, he kept walking. "What matters is that you're here now."

This time, Yugito was the one to gape, frozen in place as the Raikage and his escorts continued moving, Darui giving her one last glance before regaining his place at the Raikage's side.

 _Does he even_ care _about me?_

Yugito snapped out of her funk as there was a cry of shock from up ahead, causing her to spring forward, lashing the rosary wrapped around her left arm out, the beads lighting up with chakra before bursting into flames, which twisted and writhed, turning into arcs of fire that connected the flaming beads, creating a simple chain-link whip. Gripping the flaming chains in her hands, she leapt into and through the brush, leaving charred leaves and branches in her wake, snarling with murderous intent. What she came upon, however, had that intent twisted into shock, as she gazed down into the volley of mountains that made up Unraikyo Pass. The trademark low-hanging clouds that disguised the ground- and the safe path through- were gone, revealing the valley below.

The lake and rivers that led down to it ran red with blood, pieces of what used to be people garbed in the clothes of Kumo Shinobi littered the water and ground surrounding it. Where there was once dry, solid stone now was soaked in water, with the occasional piece of cloth or parts of a shredded flak jacket scattered about. Standing alone, above the least mauled body, was a dark figure holding a giant sword that looked to be made of scales. The figure stared down at the body before looking to the scaly sword in his hand, watching intently as they retracted into something that more resembled the sword it was. The figure hefted the famed "Greatsword" Samehada over his shoulder before turning away from the body and looking straight at them.

"YO, BRO!" Bee called out to them, waving them over. Yugito felt the chains regress back into the rosary, which she wrapped around her arm once more. Jumping down with the others, she watched from the side as A berated his brother for acting so blasé when the entire squad of Jonin he'd assigned to protect Bee was dead. Bee, oddly enough, became deathly serious when they were mentioned, gesturing to the dead body before him. "This Akatsuki dude went after me. Said his name was Hoshigaki. Wanted to bring in the Hachibi, but underestimated the might of Kill- URK!"

Having enough of his horrid rhyming- though that last one wasn't quite as horrible as his usual attempts- Yugito slammed her fist into Bee's gut with all the strength she had, sending the man down to the ground, Samehada flying from his grip and landing next to him. Looking up at his attacker in confusion, his mouth split into a grin, but Yugito followed up with a fist in his face before he could say anything more.

"Now is not the time for your insipid rapping." She stated, grinding her fist into his face to get the point across. Pulling back, Bee reached up to grip his jaw, testing it for soreness. Glancing up at the raging woman before him, her look intensified when his brother joined in, and he relented.

"Fine." He bitterly spat out, gripping Samehada and using it to prop himself back up. "I killed him, but not before he used this massive Water Prison to slaughter everyone."

"How'd you win?" Yugito asked, warily glancing down at the corpse of the Monster of Kiri, noting how his arms were shredded, like a number of Kunai had found their home there, up to the torn bits marking his shoulders, bits of muscle, sinew and skin -with some pieces of scalp- marking the stain where his head would have been. It was obvious what had happened.

Kisame had been beheaded by his own sword.

"Turns out his sword eats chakra." Bee answered, drawing her attention back to him. "It likes mine, and didn't want me to die, isn't that right?"

Yugito just _knew_ she'd be having recurring nightmares involving Bee and his _pet_ sword for weeks, if not years, to come.

The strange warbling sound that was akin to _purring_ didn't help any.

~~***~~

"So how's this gonna work?" Utakata's voice rang out as they watched the shore disappear, marking their entrance into the Land of Water. Chojuro looked at him oddly, while Yagura hmm'd in thought.

"What do you mean?" Mei asked, watching him from the corner of her eye.

"I just mean, I went missing-nin, and Yagura's the 'dead' Yondaime." He rolled his eyes and added air quotes to the word "dead". "Surely it can't be as simple as the two of us walking back into Kiri and ignore all that's happened."

Yagura frowned, and Mei shrugged, but it was Ao that answered.

"Since the inauguration of the Godaime, your reason for defecting was considered just. A team of hunter-nin would have been sent out to convince you to return, but after hearing about Akatsuki's presence and that battle where you were last seen..." He trailed off, though his face clearly showed his displeasure at having to repeal a missing-nin. Utakata nodded, though he didn't meet his former comrade's gaze.

"Utakata's right, though." Yagura spoke up, drawing the attention of Mei from the sky. "His presence can be explained easily enough. Mine, however..."

"That _is_ a problem." Mei frowned. "While the transition into becoming a more peaceful village has been going quite smoothly, there are still Shinobi that long for the days of the 'Bloody Mist'. With your return, those still longing for those days may expect you to take up the role of Mizukage once more."

"Kiri's still recovering from the Bloodline Purge." Chojuro added, before looking away, and mumbling an apology for interrupting.

"He's right." Ao said, gesturing to Chojuro. "While many people like me will want you back in office, to do so would spark another civil war, one which Kiri will not recover from. We're at war, infighting would be detrimental to our survival."

"Perhaps you could stay with our Daimyo?" Mei suggested, earning a look of disgust from Yagura.

"No!" He schooled his face and regained his composure before continuing. "He isn't one to likely agree with that reasoning. While he is lenient concerning Kiri's actions, he isn't very forthcoming when Shinobi infringe on the power that people like him hold. My presence might make things worse. No. I'll go into Kiri with you." He held up a hand to prevent any arguments. "There's no alternative. Utakata won't be trusted enough by the Shinobi to allay their fears of his loyalty, and I myself can handle anything they wish to throw at me."

"How? You were essentially a dictator." Utakata queried, watching the former Kage interestedly.

"Simple." Yagura replied. "By telling them that I was being controlled."

"Not simple." Mei countered, shifting her elbows off of the railing to stand at her full height. "A portion already knew, or suspected. To confirm their fears so lightly will be disastrous."

"Don't ya just hate politics?" Utakata joked, nudging Chojuro in the arm with his elbow. The young man stuttered, mumbling out something about how it wasn't his place to say such things. While Mei and Yagura continued bickering over the merits of simply telling the entire populous of Kiri that their previous Kage was a scapegoat for the majority of his reign, Ao took the chance to talk to Utakata.

"The Hunter Division is still sore about your defection, you know."

"I figured, what with fighting off Yagura's guard. Sorry about that, I guess." Utakata answered, spinning around the watch the waves. Ao narrowed his one visible eye, and Utakata could feel the tingling sensation of the man boring a hole in the back of his head. "Though I dunno if it can even be considered my fault. Yagura was pulled into a fight with Naruto and Han, and went full Sanbi on them." The revelation that Yagura _did_ have complete control over his Biju wasn't new, but the confirmation that it wasn't just an overblown exaggeration was startling. "He even started on the Biju Ball, showing how serious he was about winning. Heh." Utakata chuckled. "Of course, if they hadn't drawn him into that battle, he wouldn't have been freed from Madara's control."

"How, exactly, does that tie into the claim of it not being your fault?" Ao asked, barely understanding who Naruto and Han were- clearly two of the wayward Jinchuuriki- while he had no clue what a "Biju Ball" was. Utakata rolled his eyes, irritating the hunter-nin to no end.

"While, when he formed the Biju Ball, the condensing of the Yokai was enough to release him from the control." Here Utakata's expression dropped. "Yagura was so shocked at the sudden freedom, however, that he lost control of the Biju Ball. It imploded."

"And..." Ao pressed, and distantly noted that both Mizukage had stopped bickering to listen to the story.

"The ferry we were on got caught up in the blast. The surviving hunter-nin were killed, and the rest of us barely survived." Utakata took a breath. "Roshi killed two men- Ushi and Baku- with some form of Nintaijutsu, but I wasn't able to see what it was, though it messed him up real bad afterward. The rest were lost when the Biju Ball imploded."

"...I see." Ao impassively replied, not pressing for any more details. "Thank you."

"What?" Utakata looked up, confused. "Why thank me?"

"Because you weren't the one who struck the killing blow to any of them. They died in battle, as noble a way to go as possible in our profession." The statement sent the group into a deeply contemplative silence, each wondering how the presence of the Jinchuuriki would affect the Shinobi of Kiri.

~~***~~

"...And if you even _think_ of running off like that again, I'll have you brought back to Iwa so fast you'll think you never left." Onoki finished his rant, the quartet flying through the clouds as though it were an everyday occurrence. Roshi internally groused at having been the subject of that entire speech, even though he'd long since perfected ignoring Onoki's rants and complaints to the point where even he himself needed reminding of them. "Of course, all that won't matter once I instate you as the Yondaime."

"No!" Roshi crossed his arms, twisting to face the elderly man so he could clearly see the gesture. "I will _not_ be your successor. If you're really desperate about finding someone to replace you, why don't you just put your son in charge? He's certainly strong enough."

"But he's not cut out to lead Iwa like you are." Onoki countered. Roshi scoffed.

"Like I am? Why don't we list just how 'cut out' I am." Roshi held up a finger. "I all but defected the first chance I got." He raise another finger. "When the chance to defect _did_ come up, I leapt at it like a starving tiger." He raised a third finger. "And finally, I don't want the job. So why don't you take that and shove it up your wrinkled old-"

"ROSHI!" Onoki's face was almost purple, making his nose seem normal by comparison. "There is a child present!"

"I know." Roshi grinned ferally. "Who do you think I learned that one from?"

Onoki sputtered, looking for an appropriate response, while Kurotsuchi blushed at being outed as the source of all insult against her grandfather. Looking away, she spotted her other uncle- Han- staring at her. Suddenly feeling _very_ self-conscious, she tried to ignore it, but no matter how hard she tried, he wouldn't stop staring.

"Is there something you want?" Kurotsuchi asked, more than a little uncomfortable with his interest in her. Shaking his head, he looked ahead, towards the mountains. Now officially creeped out, she distanced herself from him, intent on ignoring him until they reached Iwa, where she'd ensure that they didn't cross paths the entire time they were there.

"I'm sorry." The sudden declaration nearly had her in a downward spiral, but being the consummate professional she was, she quickly deduced that it was Han talking to her.

"Sorry for what?" She asked dubiously twisting to look at him.

"For staring." He scratched his cheek abashedly. "I just wasn't sure how to go about this."

A pit of dread started forming in her stomach, and she began formulating plans of attack should it be right.

"Go about what?" She slowly inquired, watching him intently. He sighed, the sound all to mechanical, like like the decompression of one of those medical apparatuses used to help people breathe.

"Getting to know you." He answered simply, before backtracking at the horrified look on her face. "No, not anything like that. Just... while I was away, I learned some things, and one of them had me wondering just how much I knew about my family."

"Oh?" The pit in her stomach let up, disappearing completely.

"Yes." Han replied. "I met this one boy, about your age, and he never knew who his parents were. Everyone he'd trusted in his life and looked to for guidance knew who they were and never told him. He wasn't sure what to make of it, and still doesn't know."

"And this had you thinking about your own family." Kurotsuchi supplied, getting the picture. Han nodded.

"That's right. Which is why I'd like to get to know both you and your family better." Kurotsuchi didn't know what to make of it. On one hand, it was her very scary uncle that didn't seem close to any of his family with the exception of his brother, and even then their relationship was professional at best. On the other hand, here was a man who had had an epiphany and was willing to get closer to his family.

"Um, I don't know about Ma or Pa, but I'm willing if you are." Han looked relieved at that answer, and Kurotsuchi would have felt bad for the guy, if she didn't find this entire experience surreal.

~~***~~

Naruto and Fu walked together, several paces behind Tsunade and Jiraiya, the path to the gates clearly seen beneath their feet. The silence permeated the air like an ever-present beast, stifling all attempts at conversation.

"So, Naruto, are you-" Jiraiya started, only to be cut off.

"I'm fine, thank you." He curtly answered, not looking at the pair ahead of them. Fu glanced uncertainly between the trio, unsure if she should speak. After several seconds of internal debate, she finally thought ' _to hell with it_ ' and spoke up.

"So what's Konoha like?" She asked, breaking the silence to the point where one could almost hear it shattering like glass. "I mean, back in Taki, we were only told that it was one of the five greater Hidden Villages, and even then, there wasn't much about it in detail."

"Well," Jiraiya started, looking over his shoulder to the pouting blond man and teal-haired woman. "There's really no great way to describe it, but if you want, Tsunade could arrange a tour for the both of you?"

"I'll pass." Naruto answered, drawing attention to the teen. Jiraiya frowned, though he wasn't the one to address the blond.

"That's it." Whirling around, Tsunade glared at the younger blond. "Look here brat. If I could change the past, I would, but what's done is done, and no amount of wishing can change it."

"What, you think I'm still sore about the banishment?" Naruto looked at her askance, before scoffing. "I've long since moved past that. You had your reasons for what you did, no matter how stupid they were."

"Stupid?" Tsunade repeated at him, gaping in awe. "You think that after everything you said to your friends, what you did to them, that what I did was 'stupid'? Do you even know what you said to them?"

"Yes, I do." Naruto's face looked pained. "I wasn't in the right state of mind at the time, but I still remember it clear as day. For a time, I didn't regret having said any of that, but it wasn't until I had my connection to Kyuubi removed that I really started to regret it all. But you know what?" Naruto fixed both older Shinobi with a hard look. "I forgave myself and moved on. I found a new goal in life, and being a Shinobi of Konoha's got nothing to do with it."

"What?" Tsunade reeled back, shocked, allowing Jiraiya to step in.

"What about being Hokage? What about being better than all the previous Hokage?" Jiraiya looked down at his godson piteously. "Was all that a lie?"

"No." Naruto answered. "I fully believed that I could become Hokage, but that dream died when you removed me from the ninja ranks."

"It was only temporary!" Tsunade argued.

"YOU LEFT ME!" Naruto screamed, tears at the edge of his eyes, blurring his vision, and his throat closing, making his voice unnaturally raw. "FOR DEAD! Do you have _any_ idea how terrifying it is, to be a Jinchuuriki and have your chakra sealed? To wake up in the middle of nowhere with the barest of essentials required to survive? To feel your skin burn and blister under the sun as you try to catch fish with your bare hands? To barely be able to fend off a pack of hungry wolves, with only a pair of Kunai to keep them away?"

"Naruto-" Tsunade started.

"YOU DON'T!" He screamed at them, the tears freely falling. "YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE! YOU WILL _NEVER_ KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE!"

"THAT'S ENOUGH!" Jiraiya shouted, bringing all attention on them. "We had _no_ idea of what would happen, so don't blame us for that."

"You're right." Naruto said, his voice evening out, only a slight thickening of it belying that he'd been close to tears seconds earlier. "I don't."

Jiraiya almost let out a sigh of relief, if he couldn't feel the catch coming up.

"I don't," Naruto continued, looking at them apathetically. "Because you lied to me about my parents. I blame you for not telling me. For not being there when I needed another person to cry to. For not even _thinking_ of the implications of being borne of a Jinchuuriki. _That's_ what I blame you for."

"We-" Tsunade tried to argue but was cut off.

"'didn't know'." Naruto finished her sentence, glaring at her coldly. "You keep saying that, but do you really mean it? Did you really not know what happened to Kyuubi after it was used by Madara in his fight with your grandfather at the Valley of the End? Did you really not know that Minato" Neither Sannin missed the distant way he'd addressed his father. "was looking for ways to exploit my connection with Kyuubi?"

"We didn't!" Now Tsunade was the one near hysterics, Jiraiya holding her by the shoulders while glaring at the younger blond.

"Minato would never-" He began.

"He wouldn't what? Research to see if children borne of Jinchuuriki were affected by the Biju? Look for ways to allow it without me going insane? Study different seals to use on Kyuubi? Tell, me, which of these things doesn't sound like something he would do?" Naruto contested.

"Minato would have looked those things up to protect you!" Jiraiya argued, and Naruto shook his head, stepping towards the taller man.

"Protect me? Really?" Naruto started laughing, his entire body shaking with each exhale, before he stood straight and looked at the Toad Sannin in amusement. "There were at least a _dozen_ different seals he could have used that would have produced the same effects, but without him dying, but he probably didn't want to ask my mother- the woman he was going to kill with my birth."

"He loved your mother and she loved him!" Jiraiya snarled, and wondered if Naruto really had gone back to normal, or if he was still unstable and violent.

"If Minato loved her, he wouldn't have made me Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki." Naruto softly answered, giving Jiraiya pause for the space of a heartbeat, before he was scooped up in the grip of the Sannin and pushed against a nearby tree, the man's hands wrapping around the teen's neck, bordering on crushing his airway and asphyxiating Naruto's brain.

"Don't talk about your father that way, boy." He snarled, and squeezed his hands further before a wall of earth sprang up between them, forcing Jiraiya to relinquish his grip on the flailing blond's neck.

Naruto dropped to the ground, channeling chakra into his throat, making the purple-black skin fade away as the cells were healed. Coughing, Naruto got up on all fours and pressed his hand against the wall, using it to help himself stand. Gasping, he simply glared at both Sannin before stumbling into the waiting arms of Fu, who rubbed his neck, massaging the muscles as they healed. While Naruto was regaining the ability to breathe normally and talk, Fu addressed the two Sannin.

"Before meeting Naruto, I thought that a Jinchuuriki was a type of creature, similar to a human, that lived only to serve the Hidden Village it was born it. I didn't even think of myself as human, and thought of others as being inferior beings." She explained, confusing the two Shinobi. "Whenever I thought about my heritage, I dismissed it as them being Jinchuuriki also, and they had died serving Taki shortly after I'd been born. It wasn't until I met them in real life that I learned that they were a pair of Shinobi related to the founders of Taki, who had _gladly_ and _willingly_ gave me up to the village to become the next Jinchuuriki. They didn't even acknowledge that I'd been their child, treating me like another tool to be used. I'd thought nothing of it until recently, when I'd fully kicked those thoughts. Now, when I think of them, I feel anger. At them, for giving me up. At Taki, for making me the way I was." She took a deep breath and looked them both in the eye. "Knowing that, Naruto is fully entitled to say what he wants and think however he likes about his parents. Who are you to say otherwise?"

"Because he's wrong." Jiraiya argued. "He knows a bunch of facts, which isn't the truth. I knew Minato, and he never would have done that. I'm sorry that your life was so horrible, but the actions of others in the past _cannot_ be changed, no matter how much we wish them so."

"Facts are things that are true, and a number of them put together form a truth. We never can know if it is _the_ truth, but we believe it to be. That is why no one is ever right or wrong." Naruto's raspy voice spoke up, so hoarse it was almost like he'd sounded before being banished. "The Sandaime Hokage himself told me that, when I was younger. To argue the truth I have reached is to argue everything I know to be true. Is that what you're doing?"

"No." Jiraiya conceded defeat, recognizing his Sensei's unique proverbs.

"Good." Naruto nodded, his voice getting smoother. "Now, my qualm is not with the two of you or Konoha, but with the ideals you live by. Leave me in peace and I shall do the same."

He started walking, leaning on Fu to stay upright for the first few steps, before continuing down the path towards Konoha, leaving two stunned Sannin in his wake.


	25. Siblings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> separate arcs for each village. here is gaara's story.

The gates of Sunagakure were the most intimidating out of all the Greater Nations. During the Second Great Shinobi World War, when almost the entire ninja force of Kumogakure were upon its walls, it withstood the attacks without so much as a single crack. Not even the young Jonin that would one day hold the title of Sandaime Raikage could penetrate those walls with the most powerful of his black lightning jutsu.

It was these very gates that Gaara came to view when he laid eyes on Sunagakure for the first time in over three years. Feeling the penetrating gaze of the two dozen Chunin standing guard within the many tiers, many of whom were little older than he.

"Elder Chiyo! Lady Temari!" The lone Jonin of the guards greeted them, eying Gaara just as much as his Chunin comrades. Tearing his gaze from the silent red-head, he faced Chiyo. "Where is the Godaime?"

"I am saddened to bring news of the Godaime's death." Chiyo answered, bowing her head in respect to the felled Kage. "However, I implore you to start wartime preparations and call a council meeting."

"Of course Elder Chiyo." The man nodded, turning his one lone eye to gaze upon his subordinates, nodding to them. The Chunin began running through a long string of hand seals while the Jonin led the group through the gates. There was a slight breeze and a faint shimmer in the air when all the Chunin finished the identical string of seals, making the gates seem like nothing more than a mirage to anyone who looked. "May I ask who shall be the acting Kazekage and who we are at war with?"

"I'll answer both of those at the meeting. I want our best tacticians and transmission to the Daimyo there as well."

~~***~~

The council room wasn't elegant in the slightest, only being a simple rounded table in the middle of the room, overlooked upon on one end by the statues of the previous Kazekage. It was here, in the shadow of her predecessors, that Chiyo stood before the war council. The council itself wasn't very big, or illustrious, only containing a half-dozen individuals, but it was more than enough.

"I bring news from the Gokage Summit." Chiyo began, looking all of them in the eye. "I stand here the Rokudaime Kazekage, ready and willing to lead you into war, and humbly ask for your aid in ensuring that we are victorious in our efforts."

"Who are we fighting against?" A sharp-faced man with sandy brown hair asked, dressed in typical Jonin garb.

"Yeah." Yura, the man who'd headed the gates and led Chiyo and her entourage into the room seconded. "Which of the Hidden Villages are we at war with?"

"None of them." Chiyo answered. "They Five Great Hidden Villages are joining together to fight a common enemy."

"Impossible!" Doku, the sharp-faced man exclaimed. "Such an event has never happened before. What could all of them possibly be fighting against that holds such power!"

"Akatsuki." Chiyo replied, looking at them all to stave off any questions. "They attacked the Gokage Summit, resulting in the death of the leader of the Land of Iron, the Godaime Kazekage, along with several important ninja from various Hidden Villages. The attack was premeditated, and their goal was to take down the Kage, leaving the Hidden Villages without leadership, and susceptible to invasion."

"Then the Shinobi of Sunagakure shall follow under your orders." Yura promised. "Such an attack is a brazen act of war, not only towards the Kage, but to all Shinobi of the Hidden Villages. I do not think for a second that any Suna-nin won't believe the same.

"The Puppet Corps shall follow under your orders, sister." Ebizo, Chiyo's brother vowed. Next to him, Doku nodded, pledging his support of the actions, with the rest of the council following suit.

"Good. Then we can move on to the next order of business." Chiyo stood up straight, gesturing to the figure hidden deep within the shadow cast by the five statues. The man walked towards the table, and once his features were visible, almost all of the people present became ashen.

"The Yondaime..." Yura breathed, eyes wide. Murmurs began to spread throughout the room, of the great and venerable Yondaime Kazekage alive once more.

"I am not my father, no matter how similar I look like him." Gaara stated, shifting so that his gourd of black sand could easily be seen by the entire room. "Nor would I ever take the position he once held."

"How?" Yura asked, looking to Chiyo for an explanation. She simply shook her head, looking towards the teen.

"I believe you owe me an explanation, boy." She said, and he turned his unblinking gaze unto her.

"True." He conceded, taking a second to compose himself. "I suppose I should begin by saying that I will not go into specific details, as doing so would compromise the trust others hold me under."

"Of course." Chiyo nodded, and Gaara began to regale his tale.

"It started during the invasion." Here several of the council members winced in remembrance of that embarrassing event. "I met someone like me- a Jinchuuriki. However, he was not like me at the same time.

"He was... happy, to serve under his Kage, and didn't hate or resent his fellow Shinobi. He later told me what it was that made him so unlike me, despite our similar situations. He said that it was because he fought to protect his loved ones, his friends, those he considers family and even those he knows only in passing that made him so much stronger than me, so much... happier, than me.

"When I returned to Suna, I made many attempts at being nicer to Kankuro and Temari, though looking back I can see where I went wrong." He chuckled, the corners of his mouth twitching in amusement. "But that is a story for another time. It was these attempts to get closer to them, get to know them that I learned, perhaps foolishly, perhaps not, that my presence in Suna was... extraneous, at best.

"Then, one day when I was on duty to patrol the outer walls, I came across the boy from before. The one like me." There was a sharp intake of air as Gaara continued. "I took him with me into the city, listening while he told me all about how Konoha had betrayed him, banishing him over the very thing they made him into. Naturally, I was curious what he meant when he spoke of a run-in with an organization known as 'Akatsuki'. Imagine my surprise when I learned of a group of A- and S-Rank missing-nin intent on capturing the Biju. I vowed to accompany him in his travels, explaining how my presence in Suna was undesired, despite many, in hindsight, foolhardy attempts to open up the villagers to the idea that I am not the monster they thought I was. I removed my Hitai-Ate and left with him after gathering appropriate supplies."

"I think that that's enough of an explanation for the council." Chiyo interrupted, nodding for the group to leave. "Send in Temari on the way out." She called to the retreating backs. "She deserves to hear this as much as I do, if not more."

Soon, Temari was walking in, confusion prevalent on her face.

"I just thought you ought to hear this." Chiyo told her when she opened her mouth. Closing it, she crossed her arms and leaned against the wall, staring at Gaara hopefully.

"There wasn't much of a direction he wanted to go in." Gaara continued his story. "I suggested we head north through the Land of Rain and into the Land of Earth, seeking greater understanding concerning our status as Jinchuuriki. The trip through the Land of Rain wasn't one I'll ever forget, nor will my friend, I believe.

"Our travels took us through the ruins of cities destroyed and abandoned during the wars. There were things moving in the shadows of the ruins, though whether they were survivors or the ghosts of those who lost their lives. Of course, it wasn't until we sought refuge for the night that we got our definitive answer." Gaara took a sharp breath, looking forward but not seeing anything. "It was the shell of a house, somehow still standing, all but one room gouged out of it from some past battle. There was nothing left, so we took our refuge in that sole room, my friend sleeping while I meditated.

"Some time later the both of us were woken by the sounds of people outside the room, and when we looked, it was as though the house hadn't been gutted at all. There was a family, even, laughing as they made dinner, and just as ethereal as the rest of the house. We got out of there by breaking down one of the walls of the room we were in, which brought the entire house down, though the sounds of the family's laughter remained."

"My god..." Temari whispered.

"The ghosts followed us to the edge of the Land of Rain, always a few yards behind us, and when we crossed the border, they just stopped and stood there, watching us, almost as though they seemed to expect us to return and join them one day." Gaara laid his gourd down on the ground, sitting in one of the empty chairs. "From the Land of Earth, we went from Tenshi-Gai to Takigakure, heading East into the Land of Water. Along the way more people joined our growing troop until we ended up staying on the edge of the Land of Water for over a year. After that, we traveled around a little, though mostly to regain lost supplies, such as clothes and weapons. In fact, it was on a whim that led to the rescue of Yugito, as my friend and his... lover," Gaara sounded unsure of the term. "wanted to see the Land of Iron. Pure luck had us running into you."

"That's missing a lot of details." Temari commented, and Gaara nodded.

"Obviously." He replied. "To give anymore information would be to break the trust bestowed upon not only myself but everyone in our group."

"By who?" Temari asked.

"One of our own." He answered cryptically.

~~***~~

The walk through the halls was filled with tension, neither of the two speaking. The only sound that could be heard was the faint clacking of Temari's heels on the hard stone, the sound reverberating from the walls and ceiling to appear much louder than it actually was.

"I apologize."

The statement caught Temari off guard, though she didn't miss a beat and immediately replied.

"For what?" She asked, coming to the door of her family's residence. "For leaving? For not even _trying_ to get to know us?"

"I did not know." He answered, and Temari whipped her head around to look at the remorseful look he was giving her. "I spent the majority of my life keeping others at arms length. Uncle saw to that. For almost all of my life, I never really understood how one made friends, nor had I ever really cared about making friends. I had myself, and lived and spent my days being selfish, even to the point of ignoring when others tried to make _me_ their friend."

"More like threatening them..." Temari muttered, casting a small glare at the red-head, who coughed uncomfortably.

" Right." He shifted, reaching past her to twist the doorknob and open the door. "It was because I had no experience outside of watching others interact that I had a fairly wrong idea of how to open up to others- something I've gone to great pains to fix in the last few years."

"So you weren't all that good socializing. _Anyone_ could have told you that." Temari stated, stepping over the threshold and into the apartment.

"And yet no one did." Gaara said. "None of you thought to tell me that I was going about it all wrong."

"Gaara-" Temari started, affronted.

"No!" He interrupted, standing in the doorway. "Don't think that you can be so easily forgiven. I _tried_ for weeks and none of you believed it, none of you sought to help me."

"I was always there!" She contested, raising her voice to her younger brother.

"Temari? You home?" A voice called from the other room, bringing the fight to a grinding halt. Stepping into the hall was a tall man, his scruffy brown hair haphazardly sticking out of his cat-eared hood. On his face were dark purple lines, wrapping around both eyes and his lips, and moving to curve around his head. Noticing the red-head with Temari, he stopped, confusion marring his face until he noticed the dark lines around his bright, pupil-less teal eyes. Suddenly his eyes flicked up towards Gaara's forehead, where the kanji for 'love' could be seen clear as day. Taking a step back, he gasped out a single word. "G-Gaara?"

"Kankuro." Gaara inclined his head towards the eldest male of the Yondaime Kazekage's children. "It has been a while."

"Y-Yeah, it has." Kankuro weakly replied, standing rigid in the doorway to what must have been his bedroom.

"I don't believe I ever quite thanked you for helping me and my friend before I left." Gaara asked, and Temari scoffed, bringing the attention to her.

"You _knew?_ " She rounded on the puppeteer, who threw up his hands in defense.

"He and some blond kid approached me, said that they wanted to know about Akasuna no Sasori. I told them what I knew and he told me not to mention it to anyone!" Kankuro explained, looking at Gaara fearfully. The red-head sighed.

"I apologize if it came off as a threat. I'd intended it to be a simple favor." Temari gasped, her entire form seeming to swell in size, taking up the entire space of the hallway. However, before she could begin to berate Gaara for his actions, the man in question held up his hand. "But, I can see that no matter how considerate of you or others I am, you'll still see me as the monster I touted myself as when we were younger."

The statement had Temari appear to deflate in size, but before she could protest that proclamation, Gaara had stepped out into the hall.

"I see that if I stay here, I'll only be intruding. If you'll excuse me, I shall go find my _own_ place to stay." As he said that, he gripped the doorknob and pulled it with him, shutting the door on his family.

~~***~~

In the years following the installment of a new Wind Daimyo, Sunagakure had rarely been so prosperous. Where once there were boarded up, empty shops there now were new businesses. More Shinobi walked the streets, and there weren't any more beggars lining the out-of-business stores. Yes, Sunagakure never looked quite so lively, not even in the early days of its creation.

Walking through these streets, Gaara was given a wide berth, everyone seeming to recognize him immediately- something he had figured would happen, given how distinctive his tattoo was. Those that remembered when he'd been less than sane seemed almost scared of his presence, while the rest of the population simply sneered at him, whispers of 'the demon returning' and similar things spread throughout the crowd, causing an even greater rift between him and the villagers, almost to the point where they were pushing up against the storefronts in the fight to get the furthest out of his way as possible.

"Gaara!" The voice called out to him, and he didn't stop in his search for a place to stay. "Gaara wait!"

"Is there something you wanted to say to me?" He said, halting in his tracks, but not turning around to face his pursuer. "Or can I be on my way?"

"Look, I know I wasn't the best sister, but that doesn't mean that I didn't try." Temari said, looking at his back. "Every time, _every_ time you wanted to kill someone, to go after someone, I tried to reach out to you, to get you to stop this madness. Yet even now you don't listen to me."

"You don't give me reason to." He replied, back still turned to her.

"I'm your sister. Isn't that reason enough?" She pleaded, and Gaara didn't reply, just standing there.

"In another time, In another place, it would have." He finally said. "However, this is not that time, nor is it that place. You reached out to me and I was too blind to see it, and when I was the same you did likewise to me. If you'd been the sister you were supposed to be-"

"I DID THE BEST I COULD!" She shouted, her voice cracking towards the end. "I did the best I could." She followed up, her voice much softer. Taking a deep breath to compose herself, she continued. "Family is supposed to stick together, supposed to be there for each other, no matter what. You made it difficult to stand by you, and I'd have preferred if you had stayed here in Suna, but you're still my family. Don't you ever forget that."

Gaara remained silent, and Temari silently pleaded to every deity that she knew of that he would feel the same.

"I never did." He turned to her. "I was once told that, in the absence of a family, one makes his own family out of his close friends, assigning them into the different roles of the family he missed out on."

"What's that have to do with this? With us?" Temari cried. "With _me?_ "

During my travels, I came to be part of a group that is almost like a real family. Each of us has our assigned roles, and we sometimes fight, but we were there when one of our own needed our support. We were there to fix each others' flaws, mend each others' hearts. We are our own support, our own family, and you aren't in it." Gaara explained, turning to look at her with a repentant visage. "I'm sorry, but I don't think we can consider each other family."

"No. No, no, no..." Temari whispered, her eyes brimming with tears.

"But perhaps we can start anew, as friends." He walked up to her, offering his arm and a tiny smile. "What do you say? Friends?"

That was the breaking point, and the tears started pouring out. She rushed forward, clutching him, holding him close, almost to the point of smothering him. Gaara wrapped his arms around her, forming a hand seal and disappearing in a flash of sand, destined for her apartment in the Kazekage's Mansion.

~~***~~

The rest of the day went by rather nicely, in Gaara's opinion. After taking a bawling Temari back to her apartment, Kankuro had helped extricate her from him, and get her into her room, before showing the red-head into the spare room. He'd still been nervous around Gaara, but the teen figured that Kankuro had loosened up a bit after... 'talking' with Temari, and would come to accept him over time. Going to bed, he had been resting peacefully for most of the night.

"AAAHHHHH!" Cue girlish screams.

 _Of course..._ Gaara's eye twitched and he opened his eyes, before closing them again in a futile effort to fight against the bright light that was shining into his eyes.

Every _single time I'm getting a good night's rest, someone has to go and ruin it._

"Is there a problem?" He says to what surely must be Temari, sitting up and twisting his torso so he was facing her- or in her direction, given that he still had his eyes tightly shut. All he got was hysterical babbling.

"You- you were- h-how?" She finally manages to get out, breathless and on the verge of hyperventilating.

"I was asleep." Gaara say, speaking slowly, like one would to a young child. Cracking open his eyes, he resigned to the fact that he wasn't going to get any more sleep that day. "It is a relatively new thing, so I would appreciate it if you were to not scream and wake me in the future."

"How?" She says again, leaning against Kankuro, who's slumped up against the wall in a dead faint. Gaara raised an eyebrow upon seeing the puppet-user.

_Was he always here?_

"One of my friends is skilled in Sealing. He strengthened my seal, and helped me learn to control Shukaku enough to sleep, something I find... novel, I think, is the correct term."

"Oh." Her breathing slows down, and Gaara yawns, getting out of his bed and stretching, feeling his joints pop as they worked out the stiffness from the night of inactivity. "I wasn't the only one that screamed, you know."

Gaara looked down at the prone form of the puppet-user, staring at the unconscious man before turning to Temari.

"I didn't know that Kankuro's voice could reach such a high pitch."

Temari, against her better will, laughed.

"Me neither." She said, and watched as a stream of black sand snaked out of the equally black gourd to encircle her brother, lifting the eldest son of the Yondaime Kazekage into the air and sent him out of the room and into the one directly across from Gaara's- Kankuro's own room. Seconds later, there was a muffled thump before the sand returned to the gourd.

"Kankuro's in his bed." Gaara elaborated for the curious woman. "If I could get some privacy to prepare for the day?"

"Oh!" She left the room, stopping at the doorway briefly. "Breakfast in twenty. Bring Kankuro with you."

"Of course." Gaara inclined his head, letting her know that he understood the instructions.

~~***~~

Walking through the halls, Gaara couldn't help but notice that Temari was unusually silent- not that she wasn't quiet before, just that she was more quiet than usual. Ever since he'd told her that he'd been able to sleep for the past year, she'd pressed for details until he mentioned that it was due to changes in Shukaku's seal, after which she'd been unnaturally somber.

Knocking on one of the doors, Temari stood there for a second until it slid open, revealing the office of the Kazekage. Though, instead of his father sitting there, it was Chiyo, the green hat signifying her as Kazekage laying next to a small stack of papers on the desk. The elderly woman looked up, surprised to see the two.

"What can I do for you young'uns?" She asked, setting down the pen she'd been using. Temari stepped forth.

"You're the resident expert on Sealing, right?" The blond began, looking at the Rokudaime expectantly.

"Yes..." Chiyo answered at length, dubious as to the reason for the conversation.

"Then you'll know that it's not possible for seals to be altered, right?" Temari asked, the worry in her voice almost completely hidden.

"They can. It's just damn hard." Chiyo replied, looking askance at Temari. "Why do you ask?"

"She's looking for outside confirmation that Shukaku's seal was strengthened, and is quite unyielding, despite my assurances on the subject."

"Shukaku's..." Chiyo trailed off, her face belying her utter shock. Suddenly she disappeared, reappearing in front of Gaara. His sand shifted, yet did nothing to stop her from lifting up his shirt and calling up the seal. "You messed with my seal?"

"I was unaware that you were the creator of this seal." Gaara said, shifting to counteract the chill in the air that was now open to his torso. "However, it was improved upon by someone I trust to have great knowledge of the Sealing arts."

"It was perfect the way it was!" Chiyo argued, letting go of his shirt, which fell to cover his torso once more. " _Why_ you would add those limiters in that manner is beyond me!"

"They were added to decrease the melding of both my and Shukaku's chakra." Gaara contested. "With the way it was set up, my chakra would continuously meld into Shukaku's Yokai, which would replace my own, until I was nothing more than a living skin for Shukaku to inhabit until my death."

"You're wrong! I set it up that way so that you would be able to access and use Shukaku's chakra just as well as you would your own." Chiyo countered.

"By turning my chakra into its Yokai." Gaara pressed. "It was flawed, and would only result in a total failure of the seal and my death. Had it been left unfixed, the best thing that would have happened to me is Akatsuki unsealing Shukaku!"

"But you'd die!" Chiyo looked affronted. "Would you really give your life up so easily?"

"If it meant not becoming the avatar of Shukaku for the rest of my days, yes." Gaara snapped at her. "I would have given my life to them in a heartbeat."

Chiyo stood there, fuming, while Temari was just watching on in shock from the side, looking from one person to the other, unsure who to side with.

"If that's what you believe, then fine." Chiyo conceded. "But I wanna meet this friend of yours, that so-called Sealing expert."

"I'm sure Yagura-Sensei would be more than happy to discuss the finer points of Sealing with you." His clipped tones saying all. He turned and left, heading out into Suna.

~~***~~

Walking through the Streets of Suna, Gaara barely noticed the wide berth given to him as he stomped aimlessly through the city. _How_ she could have been allowed knowledge of those kinds of sealing techniques was beyond him, as she was obviously inept at them. Any novice worth their salt would have pointed out the inherent flaws in the seal used on him, and would _never_ have used it in a practical situation unless there was no other choice!

He was too preoccupied in his thoughts to notice when a ball knocked into his feet until one of the young children had run over to retrieve it. Picking it up, Gaara looked from the ball to the children playing in a familiar park, feeling a sense of deja vu. Behind him, the crowd of people had become deathly silent, watching the interaction with wide, fearful eyes.

"Hey, can we have our ball back?" The young child, a sandy black-haired boy no older than six was standing at his feet, the tiny arms reaching up for the ball in his hands. Looking at the ball and then back at the children, Gaara received a flashback of a similar situation, except the roles were reversed- he, at the same age as them, returning a ball only to be rejected, insulted for having taken possession of the ball.

Shaking his head of the old memories, Gaara leaned down and ruffled the boy's hair while handing him the ball.

"Of course." Gaara said, smiling at the child. "Just be careful where you kick it in the future."

In the crowd of people watching the display, Temari smiled. All around her, people were whispering to each other about how Gaara may not be the monster they thought he was.

 _He's certainly changed..._ She thought, deciding on how to spend the rest of the week with him. In front of her, Gaara seemed to have joined in on the children's game at the request of the boy he'd given the ball to. _And it seems to be for the better._

_He would have made a terrific Kazekage._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter, a trip to kumo and more family reunions.


	26. Pressure

"So, we're in agreement, then?" Ay looked over the long row of people sitting before him, paying close attention to the two on the far end. "The Alliance will split up their combined Shinobi force of 80,000 into specialized squads suited to combat each member of the Akatsuki, along with any extra forces they ally on their side."

"Yes." Intoned the group, and Yugito barely repressed a yawn. Before that mission, she would have been eagerly taking notes as Bee.. was...

" _Stop_ making up new 'rhymes'!" She snatched the little notebook out of his hands, setting it ablaze with some basic Fire Manipulation. "Do you have _any_ self-respect for yourself? Don't answer that!" She held up a hand to stop him when he opened his mouth. "There is a _war_ going on! At least have the decency to _pretend_ that you're interested!"

"Is that all, Nii?" Ay asked, and she suddenly realized that she was standing, and her voice had been getting progressively louder as she talked. "Because I could have told you that."

"Ahahaha..." She laughed, waving her hand in the air. Inwardly she hoped her ploy would move attention away from her. "I know. I was just making sure _he_ knew." She jerked her thumb at Bee, who was now giving all his attention to a newly bandaged-up Samehada.

"He knows." Ay deadpanned. "Trust me, he knows. The question is, do _you_ know?"

"What?" She stopped being all playful. "Of course I know! How could I not!"

"It just seems like you're not taking this as seriously as you normally would." He replied, and she practically _felt_ the blow to her pride.

"Not taking this seriously?" She repeated, letting out a hollow laugh. "He's the one writing down those stupid rhymes and _I'm_ not taking this seriously?"

"You know him. That's as serious as he gets." Ay responded. "That's why I'm asking about _you_ , Jonin Nii."

Well, damn. Her evasive plan backfired. Horribly, if the Raikage was calling her "Jonin Nii". He never did that unless he was extremely angry.

"I know!" She argued, almost childishly. She was met with disbelieving looks at her. "I _know_. Big war, all the Hidden Villages banding together, threat of Akatsuki looming over the horizon. I spent over a week with the majority of people the Akatsuki were thought to have captured, and one that was thought to be stuck in Konoha, insane! Not to mention, I'm one of their targets, so if anyone should know there's a war going on, and how serious it is, it should be me."

"And that's precisely my point, Nii." He countered. "You spent the past 10 days with a group of Jinchuuriki capable of fighting the Akatsuki on equal grounds after losing to them instead of returning to Kumo to warn us of their reappearance. Because of that, over a dozen Jonin are dead and we nearly lost Bee."

"Fo' Sho', my bro!" Bee rapped, before being kicked in the head by Yugito.

"So my life is forfeit against the lives of those Jonin that most likely would have died anyway?" She argued, and several people gasped at her audacity. "Oh grow up! Hoshigaki Kisame wielded the Samehada, rumored to be the strongest of Kiri's Seven Swords, making him the most formidable opponent for even Bee!"

"Hoshigaki wasn't impressed. He didn't go down easy, it was a mess!" Bee chimed in, before a heel-drop from Yugito introduced his face to the floor.

"What did I tell you about rhyming?" She ground out, grinding his face deeper into the floor with each word.

"Not to?" Was the muffled reply.

"Then _don't_." She said, adding a kick to his side for emphasis before taking her seat once more, brushing stray hairs back behind her ears, her ponytail askew. Interlacing her fingers, she looked up at Ay expectantly. "You were saying about the division of the Allied forces into regiments?"

"Yes, something which will be discussed at length when we set out to meet up with the other Kage and their Shinobi. That is all for this meeting. Dismissed." Yugito got up with the rest of the room. "Except you, Jonin Nii."

Yugito sat back down in her seat as Bee jumped up out of the crater his head had made and joined the leaving group, giving the two of them the 'peace' sign over his shoulder as he left. Within seconds, the two of them were the only ones in the room.

"You can cut the act, Yugito." Ay sighed. She raised an eyebrow.

"What act?" The Raikage stood up and walked towards her.

"This rebellious act of yours." He rounded his desk. "It may have given you an in with the other Jinchuuriki, but you can stop it and debrief me on everything you know about them."

" _What. Act._ " She repeated. "And debrief you? On what? They're happier together than they ever could have been had they stayed with their Hidden Villages? That I'm beginning to agree with them on why they chose to wander the Elemental Nations?"

"You'd best stop that line of thought immediately, Jonin Nii, or I'll have to brand you as a traitor." Ay threatened.

"Like you'd do that." Yugito scoffed. "We both know you're more interested in keeping control over the Nibi than in my well-being, so let's just cut with all this bureaucratic crap."

"Jonin Nii, you are a ward of the Yotsuki Clan, of which I am a member of, not to mention your Kage, and you will respect your superiors!" Ay argued, raising his voice.

"Like Hell I will!" She spat. "If this is what Kumo's really like, I do believe I may just give myself over to the Akatsuki the first chance I get.!"

" _You will not!_ " He screamed at her, and she nearly quailed under the chakra pressure he forced onto her. "You are a Shinobi of Kumogakure, and will continue to serve under my leadership until your death."

"And if I don't?" Yugito countered, her defense against his chakra-powered Killer Intent weakening.

"Then I will have to brand you as a traitor, and your death will come closer than you think." He intoned, his voice dropping to a whisper, the Killer Intent vanishing. "It's not something I want to do, Yugito. Not to any of you."

"I know." She answered wrapping her arms around herself. "I don't think I could say any different, were I in your position."

"I don't just care about the Nibi, but you as well." Ay said. "However, because of your circumstances, the two of you are a package deal. When I talk about protecting the Nibi, I also mean protecting you."

"You have an odd way to show it." She grumbled, but agreed with him nonetheless.

"You've met my brother." He deadpanned, and Yugito felt the sudden urge to introduce her head to the nearest wall.

"Don't remind me." She stood up, moving to leave. "If you need me, I'll be avoiding Bee's old Genin."

"Samui's been looking for you." Ay told her. "You _will_ have to confront her at some point."

"Which I'm going to avoid at all costs." Yugito answered, leaving the room.

~~***~~

"Hey, Yugito!" Bee waved to her, hurriedly shoving something that looked suspiciously like his little notebook into a pocket, and she had to repress her sudden urge to drop-kick him into next week.

 _Baby steps._ She told herself. _Baby steps..._

"Hey, Bee." She crossed her arms and gave him her best disapproval face- which he was particularly weak against. "What was that you put into your pocket just now?"

"Ahehehe..." Bee scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, and Yugito had to give him points for the innocent act. "It was my back-up songbook!"

"Your... back-up songbook?" She repeated, disbelief spreading across her visage.

"Yep!" He pulled it out of his pocket and waved it around proudly. "I always keep a second one on hand in case my first one gets filled or destroyed!"

Well... At least he wasn't rhyming.

"That's... great." She said at length, redirecting the need to burn it to ash into something more productive. "Say, where's that team of yours? You know, the Genin you took on a couple years ago?"

"Speak of the devil, and ye shall appear, for they are right there." He pointed behind him, and Yugito's hand twitched towards her rosary at his abuse of the word "there" before she hissed a command in his ear.

"I was never here!" Once she confirmed that he understood, Yugito leapt away, running as far from the trio of chakra signatures as she could get. While she was running away, Bee's team rounded the corner and bumped into him.

"Sensei!" Karui hit him in the chest, not even phasing him while her hand now hurt from the attempt. "Don't just stand there like that!"

"She's right." Omoi added, shifting the lollipop in his mouth to the side. "Someone could be carrying a sword and trip and run you through, and you would die before we could get you to the hospital. What would happen to you then?"

"Don't be so pessimistic, Omoi." Karui elbowed her teammate, and Samui just ignored them as their bickering devolved into a mindless argument. Again.

"Have you seen Yugito?" She asked Bee, who merely shook his head.

"She and I left at different times. Big bro wanted to talk to her alone, and she burned my rhymes!" He wailed at the end, but Samui just palmed her head as both her teammates continued their shouting match while her Sensei just kept up his melodramatic wails about his "poor, poor rhymes".

_Where on Earth is that woman?_

~~***~~

Yugito shifted her hips, allowing the full brunt of her weight to be supported by her arms and left leg rather than gravity, as she gazed down into the room below her through the grate. Walking around the apartment, Samui checked everywhere she could for any trace of the elusive ward of the Yotsuki and Jinchuuriki of the Nibi. Seeing none, Samui walked over to the door (which Yugito was stealthily hiding above in the air vent, with her right leg dangling out of the vent and down between the hinges and the corner of the room) and made to leave.

"I know you're here." She suddenly said. "I don't know where you are, but I know you're here. I can sense you. Meet me at that gyudon place a couple blocks away in half an hour. I just want to talk."

Having said her due, Samui left, closing the door. Yugito hung there for a moment longer, ensuring that Samui was definitely gone, before sliding out of the vent and silently landing on to ground. Glancing around, Yugito felt sure that she was safely alone in her apartment and let out a sigh of relief.

"Yo!"

"GAH!"

"Huh." Bee said, stepping in from the kitchen. "I always thought that was another one of those myths about cats..."

"Never speak of this." Yugito growled, prying her fingertips (and the tips of her sandals) out of her ceiling and twisting her body to land on her feet in front of Bee. "How did you get in here?"

"Same as Samui- through the door." He grinned at her.

"But you came from my kitchen." Yugito countered. "There's no door outside from my kitchen."

"I know." His grin didn't waver in the slightest.

"Then that means you were here, in _my_ apartment, _before_ me, the person who _lives_ here." Yugito began to rethink her plan to turn Bee into something resembling a normal person.

"That reminds me..." Bee tapped his chin in thought before rapping on wall around her door, which fell out of its place with the rest of the apartment and against the opposite wall of the hallway with a _ker-thwump_. "You need to have that fixed."

Yugito felt many things at that moment: her fingers itching to wrap themselves around Bee's neck, the muscle around her one eye (and eyebrow) twitching, and one of her veins sporadically clenching and unclenching.

"You..." She began, staring at the wall in disbelief. "Cut through the wall."

"Well, I couldn't remember where you put your spare key." Bee explained.

"So you cut through the wall?"

"I didn't think you'd like it if I destroyed your door with the missus here." He patted the handle of Samehada affectionately, which began to emit that frightening burbling noise once more.

"So you _cut through the wall?_ "

"It was either that or break a window, and that kinda thing don't fly with me."

" _So you cut through the wall?_ "

"Yep!" Bee grinned, not noticing the aura of doom surrounding Yugito and aimed at him. Her nails sharpened to points, while her canines poked through her lips. She pounced.

"DIE!"

~~***~~

Samui sat on the veranda outside Ken'ichi's, a well-known place for its gyudon, drinking tea when she heard the screams of her Sensei.

"NOT THE FACE! NOT THE FACE!" She raised an eyebrow at that proclamation, wondering who he might have pissed off this time. "BACK TO THE FACE! BACK TO THE FACE!"

Ah. Yugito. Only she could get Sensei to willingly be hit in the face.

"He better not make her miss this appointment." She muttered to herself, the cries of her Sensei falling on deaf ears. "I really need to speak to her."

Some time later, Yugito appeared, carrying a moaning Bee over her shoulder, which she unceremoniously dumped on the ground before noticing Samui sitting at one of the tables. The two briefly made eye contact, before Yugito broke it, flinching at the memory of Samui's brother. Stepping on Bee's prone from as hard as she could, Yugito used him as a stepping stone towards the table. Snatching an empty seat, Yugito spun it around and (in a flashy movement of acrobatics that had the full weight of the chair slamming into Bee's groin at one point) sat down across the table from the other blond.

"Samui." She greeted the woman.

"Yugito." Samui reciprocated.

The two sat in silence, the hustle and bustle of Kumogakure falling on deaf ears as the entire area surrounding them was enveloped in an oppressive aura not even the hardiest of Shinobi could win against: the awkward silence.

"So..." Yugito broke the silence, and the crowd around them went silent- they knew a juicy piece of gossip when it presented itself, and what was about to occur had the potential to spark a wildfire within the rumor-mill of Kumo. "How have you been?"

"Better." Samui clipped out, and the silence descended again, with the occasional moan coming from Bee, who was still laying prone upon the ground.

"I'm sorry." Yugito blurted out, and the crowd hushed once more.

"For what?" Samui raised an eyebrow.

"For..." Yugito rubbed her arms together, avoiding eye contact with the other woman. "For Atsui."

"For Atsui?" Samui repeated, setting down her cup of tea. "You're the reason he's dead, and all you can say is _you're sorry_?"

"I am." Yugito contested. "Atsui's death-"

"Is your fault." Samui interrupted, her voice on the verge of breaking.

"Samui..." Yugito began. "That's not true. Akatsuki-"

"Shut up!" Samui shrieked. "Don't use them as an excuse! Had you never needed him to go with you, Atsui would still be alive. I'd still have my brother."

"AND I WOULD BE DEAD!" Yugito screamed, getting to her feet. "Is it worth it? Is it worth having one person live while another dies?"

"If it meant Atsui would still be here, yes." Samui coldly replied, and Yugito took a step back, feeling like she'd been slapped.

"Do I really mean so little to you?" Yugito asked. "I'm your cousin! I'm just as much your family as Atsui was!"

"No you aren't!" Samui snapped. "Just because you were born to this family doesn't mean that you're a part of it. You aren't my family. You never were, not since having that, that... _thing_ put in you." She disgustingly spat out.

"And you think I _wanted_ to have it in me?" Yugito's eyes pricked with the faintest hints of tears.

"I think you never liked being related to me or Atsui or any of us." Samui's voice quieted down. "I think you were too blind to see just who cared about you."

"I never turned any of you away!" Yugito protested. "Who was there to comfort you when Uncle died? Who put all of her mission pay aside to raise you and Atsui, huh? Who?"

"I-" Samui weakly protested.

"Who?" Yugito pressed.

"That's not-"

" _WHO_?" She screamed. "ME! I was there to hold you when Uncle died! I was there to hold you close and whisper that it would all be okay! _I_ was the one who had the Raikage funnel all my mission pay into raising _you_! ME! It was all _me_! _I_ was the one who taught you how to properly throw a Kunai! _I_ was the one who worked to make sure Bee was your Sensei just so I could be there for _you_!"

"AND YOU WERE THERE TO WATCH ATSUI DIE!" Samui screamed back, tears flowing freely from her eyes. "YOU WERE ALWAYS THERE TO PROTECT US, TO PROTECT _ME_ , AND YOU DID _NOTHING_ TO STOP HIS KILLERS!"

"There was nothing I could do!"

"Bullshit." Samui whispered. "There's _always_ something."

"No there wasn't!" Yugito countered.

"BULLSHIT!" Samui repeated, standing from her seat as well. "There were _tons_ of things you could've done!"

"Like what?" Yugito snapped.

"You could've fought back!"

"I did!" Yugito contested.

"Only _after_ it was too late to save Atsui!" Samui countered.

"So you'd rather we'd have fought back and both died?" Yugito stated disbelievingly. "Are you mad?"

"I'm furious!" Samui retaliated. " _Any_ thing would have been better than what happened!"

"There was _nothing I could do_!" Yugito pressed, her defenses crumbling before her very eyes. "They'd attacked before we could, and by then it was too late! There was nothing I could do!"

"STOP SAYING THAT!" Samui was near hysterics at this point. "There must have been _some_ thing, anything, you could have done!"

"There was _nothing_!" Yugito hissed. "In hindsight, Atsui would have been better off had I killed him myself early on!"

"NO!" Samui shrieked.

"Yes!" Yugito pressed. "Whatever they hit him with, I was hit by too. All it took was a single drop of blood, and that one guy could injure _himself_ , and I was hit with the same injuries. Atsui-"

"Stop saying his name!" Samui interrupted, her voice choked up from crying. "Stop saying it."

"He was hit in their first attack." Yugito continued. "After that, the guy, Hidan, toyed with him. He begged me to leave him in his final moments. He kept babbling about how I was more important than him."

"You _aren't_." Samui sniffled.

"I told him I couldn't leave him. Not like that." Yugito's voice broke, and she began crying as well. "Do you know how hard it is, to have to watch one of the few people you watched grow up die before your eyes?"

"I can't imagine..." Samui wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

"I wanted to _die_." Yugito continued. "But I couldn't. To do so would have made Atsui's death be in vain, and I couldn't do that."

"Then why didn't you kill them?" Samui exclaimed, waving her hand out towards the edge of the village and beyond.

"Don't you get it yet? I _did_ kill them, both of them, but they just wouldn't die!" Yugito finished. "If you can't accept that, then there's nothing more I can tell you."

With that said, Yugito spun around, stepped past Bee, who was getting up, and around the crowd, who parted as she approached them, leaving Samui to stand alone in the veranda of Ken'ichi's, silent tears flowing down her face.

~~***~~

Yugito stalked the streets of Kumo, everyone in front of her parting and giving her a large swath. Before meeting those other Jinchuuriki, Yugito had always thought that the large gap given to her- and to a lesser extent, Bee- was simply because she'd always had a lot of potential, and had made everyone else jealous because of it. Now, however, she saw it for what it was- social ostracism of the highest degree. Where once she saw people looking down at her because they hated that they weren't the Shinobi they wished to be, she now saw looks of disgust and prideful haughtiness. She remembered how she'd been almost two weeks before- prideful of having been a Jinchuuriki, and would have gladly died in the line of duty for Kumogakure. Now, though...

Yugito didn't like what had been revealed to her. Everyone who gazed upon her thought she was something like the village pet, the caged beast they could just let loose on their enemies when they themselves didn't want to fight.

She hated that. Hated thinking along those lines. Hated Utakata for having saved her. Hated Atsui for not dodging that scythe.

Hated herself, for not taking that hit instead.

But she had to think along those lines. Had to thank Utakata for saving her. If he hadn't, she would have been dead and Samui wouldn't have any family left. And Atsui...

He'd made his choice. He'd been the one who had volunteered to accompany her. He'd been the one who had stepped out of the supply building first, taking point- and the attack meant for her.

And she couldn't _not_ think along those lines, blaming everyone but the person at fault for Atsui's demise.

Herself.

"Yugito?" A voice from behind called out to her, and she started, looking around hurriedly in an effort to take in her surroundings.

_When did I get back home?_

"Yugito." The voice called to her again, and she turned away from her door (and barely patched-up wall) to find none other than Darui leaning against the wall opposite her door. "Are you alright? You look like you've been crying."

"Sorry." She let out a breathy laugh, rubbing what was left of her tears out of her eyes.

"That's my line..." Darui lamented, standing up straight. "But seriously. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." She replied. "I've just been going through some personal stuff."

"Oh. Sorry for intruding." He apologized. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Yugito glanced over at him, and seemed to consider his offer. Though she'd made it clear that she wasn't interested in him, he'd insisted that they at least be friends.

 _It's either him or Bee..._ She thought, the blocky spackle from the man's latest attempt at amusing her making its' way across her vision.

"Yeah..." She answered, opening her door and motioning him to enter. Once they were seated around the table in her kitchen, waiting for the kettle to heat up for their tea, Darui lightly pressed for details.

"So... what's got you so dull?" He asked.

"Samui." She replied. "Atsui's death hit her hard, and she's blaming me for it."

"That explains the rumors spreading around of the two of you having a shouting match outside of Ken'ichi's..." Darui mused, nursing the empty cup in front of him.

"There's already rumors about it?" Yugito was taken aback. "It only happened ten minutes ago!"

Ninja village." Darui explained. "News travels fast."

"Still..." Yugito groused, but didn't comment further. "Samui blames me."

"Did she hear the whole story?" Darui asked.

"I told her near the end of our shouting match." Yugito answered.

"So there _was_ a shouting match." Darui stated.

"It may have gotten loud." Yugito agreed. "But she didn't see reason. There was nothing I could do. We were dead the moment they found us."

"You could have fought back." Darui reasoned.

"Samui said the same thing, so I'll tell you what I told her. You'd rather we'd have fought back and both died?" Yugito testily said.

"No." Darui shook his head. "I'm just making sure you knew your options. People like Akatsuki aren't the kind you can just challenge to a fight on the street without having some sort of plan in place, with several back-up plans ready to go. S-Rank isn't something achieved easily. With the number of ninja in the Bingo Book, only three or four of them are S-Rank, and that's the ones that are actually _in_ the Bingo Book."

"So you're saying there's actually more than four, maybe five S-Rank Shinobi in all the Elemental Nations?"

"Nah." Darui disagreed. "Of those half-dozen listed, a really smart group of people could easily take down most of them without much trouble. Only two, at most, of all Shinobi listed and rumored to be at S-Rank are actually worthy of holding such a title. Everyone else just barely qualifies."

"So who do you believe those two Shinobi to be?" Yugito asked, and Darui waved off her question as the kettle began to whistle.

"Don't know, don't really care." He sat up, picking up the kettle and pouring the hot water into their cups. "Honestly, I don't want to meet them and doubt I ever will."

"Because of this war." Yugito added.

"It's not much of a war." Darui continued. "Really, we're just a large group of Shinobi who banded together to take down some of the best of us. Nothing less than that would be needed to take down a group of Shinobi skilled enough to take on a Biju one-on-one and come out on top."

"I know..." Yugito trailed off, memories of her fight with those two Akatsuki surfacing in her mind.

"She's not wrong, you know." Darui's words shook Yugito out of her stupor, and she was left gaping at him in shock. "She's not right, either, but she isn't wrong in thinking that you played a part in his death."

"How can you say that?" Yugito hissed.

"I'm just saying, the one that killed him is a part of Akatsuki, yes, but who's to say that he wouldn't have died against them in this war?" Darui elaborated.

"You can't be serious." Yugito deadpanned.

"I'm just sayin'..." Darui trailed off.

"You sound like that one student of Bee's right now, you know that right?"

"Omoi's not that bad a guy, Yugito."

Sure~ he isn't." Yugito said at length, taking a sip of her tea. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. Yugito stood up, leaving the kitchen to answer the door. "Coming!" She called out to whoever was waiting for her.

Samui stood there, looking unhappy about being there, but determined to see what she had gone there to do through to the end.

"Samui." Yugito blinked. Behind her, Darui appeared in the doorway to her kitchen, and quickly made up an excuse about 'being late for an appointment with Omoi', leaving the two women alone.

"I've thought about what you said." Samui began. "And while I don't think I can fully forgive you, I believe I can at least let go of most of the hate I have for you."

"Really?" Yugito asked. "Because I would understand if you hated me. I mean, _I_ kinda hate me, for what I did and didn't do."

"Really?" Samui repeated, surprised at the revelation.

"Yeah." Yugito admitted. "There was just so many things I _could_ have done, but none of them would have gotten the both of us out of there alive."

"It's okay." Samui consoled the older woman. "Someday the both of us will move past it. Besides, I don't believe Atsui would like to see us being so down-hearted. It's not cool."

"You're right." Yugito agreed, and the two of them entered the apartment, intent on patching up their fractured relationship and helping each other through their grievances.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next time, a very long day in kiri.


	27. Split

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Utakata and Yagura both confront their pasts.

Kirigakure, out of all the Hidden Villages, had become known as the Bloody Mist for more than the reign of Tadashii Yagura. Even before the appointment of the Yondaime Mizukage, Kiri was known for it's bloodthirsty Shinobi, from the many clans created from Children, such as the Kaguya, Terumii and Yuki, among others, to the Seven Swordsmen, the deadly blades created in part by the small regent of Uzumaki due to their sealing prowess, but mostly their creation came from the work of the Shodai Mizukage, Hoshigaki Hideyoshi, who'd given his a piece of himself to create each of the seven swords, with the creation of Samehada from his own chakra leeching abilities; Kiba from the very heavens themselves (as his skill with Lightning Release was- and forever will remain- unparalleled by even the Sandaime and Yondaime Raikage); Nuibari from his pinpoint precision in stringing together dozens of Shinobi with a single strike; Kabutowari formed from his ability to penetrate all defenses; Shibuki, the embodiment of the destructive power of a single strike from him; Hiramekarei, the concussive force of his Taijutsu; Kubikiribocho, the living embodiment of his bloodlust. All of them deadly in their own right, but together... they were unstoppable. It was with these swords and these clans that Kiri rose to become the Bloody Mist, each Mizukage that took office turning Kirigakure more and more into the living embodiment of that moniker, in turn making it more and more unstable as the years wore on, with the loss of the Seven Swordsmen, all of which hadn't been a full group since the early days of the Third Great Shinobi World War, and the Bloodline Purge shortly after sending Kiri over the edge and into full-on civil war.

Until the Godaime Mizukage took office.

Yagura looked around him, noticing how different Kiri was under Mei's reign from his own. Where there were once hardened Shinobi walking the streets, wary of each other, with the civilians cowering and hiding at the mere sight of anyone wearing a Kiri Hitai-Ate, even their own family, now civilians could be seen interacting with Shinobi freely. Where once there was fear in the eyes of everyone, be it fear that they would be found to have a Kekkei Genkai, would be killed by someone with a Kekkei Genkai, or would simply die be caught in the crossfire of a traitor fighting to stay his or her execution. No mercy would be shown for anyone going against Kirigakure or aiding in the exodus of Bloodline-wielding clans. Now, there was no fear, no fighting, no chaos. None of the people he saw, be they Shinobi or civilian, looked on the verge of rioting. They weren't afraid of each other anymore, no longer moving to get to their destination as fast as they could without drawing any undue attention to themselves.

But that is to say, they didn't harbor any fear.

Now, they were afraid of him. Now, the Shinobi didn't fear each other, but feared _for_ each other as well as the civilians when they recognized who he was.

The Shinobi of Kiri no longer held any distrust for each other. Now, they feared _him_ , and all that his reign as Mizukage had embodied. Every once in a while, the occasional Shinobi or civilian would recognize him for who he had been, and would back away as quickly and carefully as they could, spreading word of his return.

That had been two days ago, when he'd first returned to Kiri with Utakata, Mei, and her escorts.

Since that day, every time Yagura was seen talking to Mei more rumors had spread through the streets of Kiri, of the return of the Yondaime (which he, understandably, had quickly quelled), of the resurgence of the Bloodline Purge (something he found quite laughable, as the Godaime wielded _two_ Kekkei Genkai, so the idea of her leading the hunt to kill her family was preposterous), and of the return of the Bloody Mist.

That last rumor was the worst of them all, as many families had begun paying close attention to the academy curriculum for any hint of their children, nephews, nieces, brothers, sisters, grandchildren being taught how to kill in preparation of murdering their own classmates, while a select few pulled their children from the program altogether. Shinobi began to watch each other again, paying close attention to those that had most staunchly followed the views of the Yondaime, while those supporters watched over those that were openly supporting the Godaime's ideals on Kekkei Genkai. Clans were congregating together, forming several different factions- those that were going to help each other survive in case the Bloodline Purge began anew, those that were only looking out for themselves and were only using their supporting clans as scapegoats to throw into the fire, and those that were preparing to begin the Hunts once more. Yagura shuddered.

Of all the horrid things Uchiha Madara had made him do, the Hunt had to be the worst. The Bloodline Hunt had been created early on in the reign of the 'Yondaime', and had first consisted of raids on clan compounds, slaughtering every single person that fought back while stringing up those that surrendered in front of the public before executing them on the spot. Of course, the raids hadn't completely wiped out all of those with Kekkei Genkai, so the raids had become the Hunt. The Hunt consisted of many people- both Shinobi and civilian- gathering together in a sort of organized mob to locate and kill anyone they found to have a Kekkei Genkai. He'd heard, seen and even been a part of these Hunts, striking the killing blows on Bloodline-wielders as old as the Sandaime Mizukage had been to as young as a newborn. Once, he'd been a part of a Hunt that murdered a Yuki, and at the pleads of the man's lover, killed her and her unborn child. The memory of holding that squirming underdeveloped baby in his hands, while the child's mother repeatedly thanked him while she lay dying, bleeding from his strike to remove the young Yuki, before wrapping his fingers around the tiny neck and squeezing, feeling the tiny pulse give way under his grip and the vertebrae explode from the pressure like the crushing of beans-

No. The Hunt was over, and would never happen again. Uchiha Madara will die, and Yagura will be the one to do so, atoning for the lives of all he'd personally slain, either directly or indirectly. God only knows how many people died at the hands of Madara because they proved too much of a threat to him.

"Lord Yondaime?" He was snapped out of his musings when he saw where his aimless wanderings had taken him- back to the Mizukage's Residence, where he and Utakata were staying. Idly, Yagura wondered where Utakata was at the moment before turning his attention towards the Jonin before him.

~~***~~

Utakata was not having a good day.

It was the first time since returning to Kiri that he was able to locate his old friends- childhood partners in crime- and they wanted nothing to do with him!

The nerve of them! What, was he too immature for them, now that they were finally going somewhere in life? So what if they were now Jonin, and on their way into ANBU? That didn't mean Aramaki and Minoru had to act like he was beneath them! They wouldn't have acted that way before he defected!

Wait.

Before he _defected_.

Oh.

There was no known protocol for Shinobi who'd defected returning to their village, just as there wasn't any protocol for a missing-nin joining a different Hidden Village. And the reason for that simply was... it just didn't happen. Shinobi who had defected from their native Hidden Village were considered either too independent to ever be able to follow anyone's orders outside of their own or too insane to control, and the bounty on their heads were occasionally known to increase as much as double their worth if they were already in the Bingo Book, which meant that it would be more beneficial to any of the other Hidden Villages to cash in on the bounty instead of attempting to recruit said missing-nin. Which meant...

_Fuck..._

Aramaki and Minoru didn't want to associate with him, if he was so desperate to leave Kiri that he'd defect while on the Mizukage's guard. To be so desperate to get out from under the Yondaime's rule that he'd risked defecting in direct view of the very man himself showed a disloyalty to Kiri that would have any self-respecting Kiri-nin think so lowly of anyone like that.

_Guess I better change their perception of me, then..._

Getting up, Utakata finally noticed where he was- that little tea place he'd hung out at when not on-duty in the Hunter Corps. Downing the last vestiges of his tea, Utakata stood, left some ryo on the table, and went to go find his old friends, mind racing on the possibilities to show them that he was still the same person he was before.

Which left him walking the streets, wondering what he could do- given their maturity and the potential backlash, setting up one of his practical jokes wouldn't go over well with anyone- he _still_ felt phantom pains from when he'd joined Naruto in playing a joke on the others by putting minute doses of itching powder in their bedding. The murderous look everybody gave them...

Right. Jokes and the like were _not_ permitted!

So, if jokes were out of the question, maybe... Utakata noticed one of those tiny fireworks stands nearby.

No. Just... no. While Utakata was a proponent of the big and flashy, even _he_ wouldn't do such a thing while the entire Shinobi force of Kirigakure was setting up for war.

Which left... yes, that would do nicely. Utakata smirked to himself as he continued down the street, past bustling Shinobi carrying boxes of supplies out of stores and homes and onto carriages. It was times like these that Utakata fell back on his old teachings.

When in doubt (or in any kind of situation, really)- improve like a bat outta hell and pray it works.

~~***~~

"Daichi, was it?" Yagura asked, confirming the Jonin's name. The man in question, sallow-faced with long indigo hair hanging in locks over his face, with more than a bit of shaky nervousness in his body, nodded.

"Katashi Daichi, Lord Yondaime." Daichi replied, and Yagura made a face of disgust.

"I would prefer it if you didn't refer to me as that, Daichi." He told the man, who grimaced.

"Ah. Apologies." Daichi remanded himself, before looking at Yagura in confusion. "But what should I call you, if not Lord Yondaime?"

"Yagura will do perfectly." He told the squirrelly man.

"Of course, Lord Yagura." The Jonin seemed to nod to himself, and Yagura briefly toyed with the idea of removing the 'Lord' title, before discarding it. Even if he hated that part of his life with the undying passion of a thousand burning suns, Yagura could not refute that he had gained the need for such a title upon being named Yondaime Mizukage. "Er, Lord Yagura, if I could confer with you, I know of a nice little place where we can do so away from any unwanted listeners."

As soon as the squirrelly Jonin mentioned 'unwanted listeners', Yagura went on guard. While nobody in Kirigakure openly hated him, that wasn't to say that there weren't any Shinobi that didn't wish to kill him. Hell, Zabuza was one of the few who _had_ acted on that impulse!

Granted, Zabuza wasn't the best of examples given his unrepentant bloodthirstiness, and he would have snapped no matter what, but still!

"Lord Yagura?" Daichi asked, waving his hand in front of Yagura's face, snapping him back to reality.

"If you are going to try to kill me, I would prefer to know here and now. Better I kill you now than with any co-conspirators and risk any collateral damage later."

Once again, Yagura was known for many things, but subtlety was not one of them.

" _NO!_ " Daichi vehemently denied, his entire body literally vibrating with nervous energy. " _Never_ in my life would I, or any of my colleagues, raise our blades to you!"

Yagura's eye twitched as he watched the man continue his tirade of loyalty, Daichi's form becoming almost blurred as his speech became more frenetic. Sighing, he moved to stop the Jonin before he hurt himself- and everyone else around him in the process.

"Fine, I believe you." Daichi became less jittery after that proclamation, falling into a similar tirade of how grateful he was to be so trusted by 'Lord Yagura'. " Yes, that's all fine and good, but if we could get on with this. I would like to return to the Mizukage's Manor soon to continue conference with the Godaime about the coming war."

"Right, right." Daichi nodded, bobbing his head in a manner much too fast for anyone to ever move their head, before stopping all movement, his body going still as the grave. He was all business as he led Yagura through the streets. "This way, please, Lord Yagura."

It was impressive, Yagura thought, that the man could calm himself to such a degree when he needed to. It showed that Daichi was certainly deserving of the title of Jonin, if he had even a fraction of such skill in battle. Nothing was more dangerous than a simple man, easily ignored, being so incredibly dangerous when the situation called for it. He himself had little skill in being ordinary, having grown up under the watchful eye of the Sandaime Mizukage, been under the tutelage of the last of the original Uzumaki settlers in the Land of Water, not to mention his entire status as Jinchuuriki. For some reason, all his attempts at being normal never felt right to him, despite how well they worked on others.

Walking through the streets, Yagura snapped back to reality when he noticed that they were entering one of the buildings- a low-set concrete house, easily hidden by the imposing businesses surrounding it. Suddenly, Yagura knew where he was being led.

Back when the Kaguya were in the early stages of planning their betrayal, they had volunteered a great number of their clansmen to build a maze of tunnels running underneath Kirigakure, connecting the many caverns that permeated the area around and underneath the village. The idea was to make a safe place for the civilians to hide out in should Kirigakure be attacked directly, as well as a last refuge for the Shinobi of Kiri to use while they fought the invaders. It had proven to work, when the Nidaime Tsuchikage himself had pressed the Kumogakure platoons so far that they were well within the Land of Water before all of them were taken down. It was then that Mu had decided, in his arrogance, to use this advantage to attack Kiri. The resulting battle between Kage was massive, crushing the entire eastern half of Kirigakure before the Nidaime Mizukage had given up his life to end that of the Tsuchikage. It was said that the Nidaime's last breaths were the appointment of the Sandaime Mizukage, with the promise to ensure that Kirigakure and the Land of Water lived on to become a nation to be feared.

Of course, the cave system had proven an effective place for Bloodline-wielders to hide out and seek refuge in, with rumors that there still lurked entire sub-cities within the caves made up entirely of Bloodline-wielders who had no idea the Purge had ended, and whose children had never felt the Sun on their face.

Daichi led him into the building, which was just as plain inside as out, with only a circular stairwell leading down into the earth, where the wet, musty smell of fungi and stale air wafted out. Walking down the damp concrete stairwell, the walls were little more than damp rock, moss and various fungi grew, occasionally to such a size that they had taken broken apart entire sections, replacing the normal stairs with a descending row of giant mushrooms. When they finally reached the cavern floor- though it couldn't really be called a 'floor', as most of the ground beneath them was little more than marshland. Scattered about were rotted wooden walkways, the remnants of safe, dry passage through the caverns. What little light shone around them came from the bioluminescent fungi growing on the walls of the cavern, lighting the place with a dull green glow that was barely suitable for anyone to see their surroundings, the darkness encroaching enough to leave definitive details too unintelligible. Standing atop the murky water, Yagura followed could do little but quirk an eyebrow at the lengths Daichi went to to ensure a secure conversation. Rumors still abounded of the maze of caverns, where once the Rokubi made its' home, being the birthplace of the legendary Slug Summons. More than once, a group of Shinobi would come across an entire passageway covered in slime, with the rare pools of acid still burning through the rock.

"You do know your way around here, yes?" Yagura asked the man in front of him, as they moved away from man-made structure leading up to the surface. All around them were passages of various sizes ranging from that of a crawlspace to massive openings capable of handling some of the smaller Summons and more destructive jutsu.

"Of course!" Daichi replied, giving Yagura a sidelong glance. "None of us would ever dare be so casual in unknown territory."

"Us?" The question was soon answered as they rounded a corner and came upon an encampment. It wasn't very big, just a couple of earthen tablets- most likely created by a derivation of a lesser Earth Release jutsu- with several maps of Kirigakure and the Land of water laid out on them, lanterns increasing the amount of light, so the minutia of the maps could be clearly seen. Scattered around the tablets were various Jonin, Chunin, and the occasional career Genin- those that had the skill to be ninja, but met none of the requirements of attaining Chunin status. Squinting against the dim light, Yagura saw hand-drawn lines and notes on the maps, locations marked and what appeared to be outlines of-

No. They couldn't. They weren't. They can't.

"We are your most loyal, Lord Yagura, Lord Yondaime." Daichi said, turning and gesturing to all present. "We've been waiting and preparing for your word, my Lord."

"My word?" Yagura asked, almost dazedly. Daichi nodded, and the group congregated behind the man before all of them bowed to the Sanbi container.

"Yes." He answered, not a single trace of his former twitchy attributes remaining. "To start the Hunt once more."

~~***~~

The streets of Kirigakure were alight, even in the fading twilight. All around him, people were abuzz, moving entire crates of food, basic amenities like tents, sleeping bags, extra Kunai and other weaponry, and flak jackets- some Chunin, mostly Jonin- and loading them onto several carriages. Those that weren't already wearing the flak jackets were ordered to do so, unable to no longer wear the protective material until after the war. Of course, that was just what the Shinobi were doing.

The civilians looked lost, like they were silent watchers witnessing all their neighbors, friends, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts, grandparents, children, grandchildren moving towards their deaths.

They weren't completely wrong.

Utakata figured it was just one of those odd things people did with each other when they were scared. Having never really had an important familial figure in his life- having lost both parents to disease and war, respectively, and his grandfather being too busy as Sandaime to ever pay attention to him. He snorted as he wandered the streets, weaving in and around the bustling Shinobi, civilians following aimlessly behind them like little lost puppies, remembering how the elderly man couldn't even be bothered to remember his name, even after retiring. Always calling him "Rokubi" or "Jinchuuriki", never "Utakata" or "Grandson", and even when he did remember that familial connection, the man barely remembered his name, most often calling him "Onigiri", even after Utakata corrected him. Yes, Utakata would freely admit that he hated his grandfather, and everything that he represented- which was why he'd thrown himself so far into the Hunter Corps. Out of all the ANBU divisions, Hunter Corps gave the most chances of being out of the village, despite being led by Yagura on Bloodline Hunts in the later years.

They also had the shortest lifespan.

While widely known as the Undertaker Squad, the Hunter Corps was known by all within it as the Walking Dead- as in the early days of the Hidden Villages hunter-nin were just as likely to die as they were to kill their targets. However, that changed with the induction of medic-nin and their teachings during the later years of the First Great Shinobi World War. Since then, it was almost a sure bet that anyone from Kirigakure with medic-nin training was a member of the Undertaker Squad. The term Walking Dead was still known for only Kirigakure's Hunter Corps, due to the large amount of high-ranking and powerful Shinobi it produced. It was because of this that the average hunter-nin taught at least 4 recruits in a single year, as at least as many died in that same time-frame against people like Momochi Zabuza, Hoshigaki Kisame, the Kaguya, the Yuki, among others.

Like him.

Utakata flinched slightly as he remembered the good half-dozen hunter-nin he'd unintentionally killed when he'd defected, and his heart clenched as he remembered the many students and comrades he'd witnessed die as they fought against those with Kekkei Genkai, who had tried to side with traitors like Zabuza and Kisame, only for the Swordsmen to turn on them and slaughter everyone in sight, ally and enemy alike. Hoshigaki's Slaughter had since become legend within the upper echelons of Kiri.

Shaking his head away from those thoughts, Utakata saw that his near-aimless wandering had taken him to his old place- a tiny apartment building, where he'd grown up with his two friends and future colleagues- Kenta Minoru and Kouka Aramaki. The three- each the youngest of their clans- had gravitated towards each other in their youth, having first met one another when they'd gotten detention in the academy. Several years previously, Zabuza had slaughtered his entire graduating class, and so the educational system had undergone a complete overhaul- of the graduation test. Teachers at the academy, up until recently, still punished misbehaving students by flogging them, or inflicting similar forms of torture on their students. For the trio, it was one of the more archaic forms of punishment- simulated drowning. While being residents of Kiri, they were quite proficient in dealing with water-based forms of torture, and had gotten quite a kick out of feigning having drowned and scaring the teachers. Ever since that day, they had gotten together, their rebellious streaks adding to each other, leading to more internal destruction than the entire Bloodline Purge had caused in later years. In an effort to control him, the Sandaime Mizukage had sent out his lapdog, Yagura (who was well into his apprenticeship with that elderly fogy, Uzumaki Kaito), to reign him in- which ultimately brought about the aforementioned destruction.

Utakata blinked himself back to the present, shaking his head while, wondering why he was so nostalgic all of a sudden. Shrugging it off, he stepped away from his old apartment, before noticing one of his comrades aiding in the mobilization of supplies with the nearby hospital.

"Hey, Kiri!" He called out to the man, who glanced over from his perch atop the caravan. Wearing Chunin garb, the medic-nin had been one of Utakata's classmates when they were learning about human anatomy and basic medicine- Utakata in preparation for the Hunter Corps, Kiri to become a medic-nin. The two hadn't been on quite the best of terms (which, in retrospect, using several cords of ninja wire to animate the practice cadavers during his first class was a _very bad, horrible_ idea of a joke, however funny the faces of his fellow medics-in-training were), Utakata still considered the guy a close enough friend to let him in on the whereabouts of his childhood partners in crime. The fact that the guy was the source of one of the premier news channels in all of Kirigakure was a bonus.

"What?" Kiri bitterly spat out, and Utakata inwardly cringed as he put on one of his more toothy smiles- the one that was proven to unnerve everyone in the vicinity.

Kiri was not amused.

"I was just looking for Minoru and Aramaki. You wouldn't happen to know where they were right about now, would you?" The smile never left his face, and one of the Genin aiding in the movement of medical supplies gave a full-body twitch as Utakata appeared in the corner of her eye.

"No." Kiri looked and sounded angry. "Go. Now."

"Well now that isn't a very good way of treating your friend, now is it?" Utakata gambled, still smiling, despite the pain his cheeks were enduring by producing such a foreign expression.

"You aren't my friend." Kiri deadpanned, taking the box of gauze from the Genin and shooing her away.

"And here I thought we bonded over that anatomy class." Utakata's cheeks felt like they were on fire, and he couldn't take much more of this.

"You made the cadavers dance." Huh. Utakata could've _sworn_ Kiri had gotten over that.

"It was funny." True statement. He still had the pictures of their faces and the choreographed "zombie dance", as it had later been dubbed.

"Everyone, including the teacher, tried to kill them a second time- and you, once we figured out what you'd done."

"Again, funny." He should find those pictures. The group would get a kick out of visual cues when he told them about it.

"I stabbed you." Kiri was getting angrier, for some reason.

"It healed." God, his cheeks felt like they were _melting_. _How_ Naruto could smile like this for days on end he'd never know!

"Go. Now. Before I stab you again." Oh. Right. Kiri was angry over the class inclusion part of the "zombie dance". He was probably justified in doing so, considering the cadaver he'd been dragged into dancing with had copped a feel.

And Utakata's cheeks were becoming numb now. _Joy._

"Only after you tell me where Minoru and Aramaki are." Utakata was never going to degrade himself like this ever again. Sure, it scared people when he did it briefly, but it hurt too damn much for it to be any good in the long-term.

"They're at the academy, if you must know." Utakata slowly let his cheeks relax, his muscles screaming in pain as the blessed numbness left them.

"Thanks!" Utakata turned and walked away, rubbing his face tenderly.

_Never. Again._

~~***~~

Yagura stood stock-still, barely able to comprehend what he'd just been told.

His word.

" _To start the Hunt once more."_

His word.

" _We are your most loyal, Lord Yagura, Lord Yondaime."_

 _His_ word.

Oh god.

They called themselves 'loyal', and he was left in awe at the depravity of people. Here before him stood a group of people who had been the most enthusiastic during the Hunts; had gleefully followed Madara's words as they came from his mouth to the letter; had been part of those few individuals who had tortured those with Kekkei Genkai before providing a mercy death.

"Lord Yagura?" He was broken out of the spiral by a Chunin- a rather exotic-looking woman with dark hair and silvery-blue eyes- who stood behind and to the left of Daichi, who was also watching Yagura with curiosity. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine..." He trailed off, waiting for her to chime in with her name, despite already knowing it.

"Munashi Kiku, Lord Yondaime." She replied, bringing her relation to the late swordsman to the forefront of his mind.

"Kiku." He repeated, still slightly shocked by what was around him to really take in the fact that he was _talking to her_. "I'm fine. I just need some questions answered."

Now was not the time to be panicking, but to gather as much information as possible and confer with Mei on how best to deal with it. It wouldn't do to have an impeding civil war within Kirigakure while the Fourth Great Shinobi World War played out in front of them.

"Anything, Lord Yondaime." Daichi chimed in, with several of the Jonin's associates giving their agreement.

"How... How long have you been planning this?" He gestured to the small encampment, and it was Kiku who answered first.

"Well, at first it was simply preparation for a strike against those that were known supporters of Bloodline-wielders after word of your attack reached Kiri, but after reports of your death and rumors of a new Mizukage being chosen by the Daimyo, we persisted in the knowledge that you weren't dead, keeping these plans ready for when you would return and lead us out of this horrible era we've entered."

"Horrible era." He repeated, shaking his head. "How is Kirigakure's rule right now a horrible era? It's the strongest it's been in years."

"No, it's not." Daichi responded, gesturing for the other Shinobi to return to the surface. "Kirigakure is at it's lowest right now, allowing those with cursed blood to roam the streets like they are entitled to. That woman who dares call herself Godaime- she herself isn't fit for the role. Not like _you_ , Lord Yagura. Lord Yondaime."

"I told you, don't call me that." Yagura seethed, having had enough of this man's crazed ramblings. "What, did you think that all that occurred during my so-called 'reign' was of my own doing? I was being controlled, all my actions and words were not my own, but that man's."

"What are you saying?" Daichi was shaking now, as was Kiku, who had lingered on her way up to the surface. "That- that you now _like_ those with cursed blood?"

"I'm saying that those ideals were never mine to begin with." Yagura stated, evening out his breathing and calming himself. "They were but the words of a madman, the very same madman that we're going to war against."

"My Lord, you shouldn't make such accusations lightly." Daichi argued. "You are the venerable Lord Yondaime, who revealed the Bloodline-wielders for what they actually were- evil beings that needed to be slain."

"No, they aren't." Yagura protested, moving towards Kiku. "You should know better than anyone, Kiku. Your uncle Jinpachi fell in love with a lovely Yuki woman, who died in the war."

"I've no idea what you're talking about." Kiku stiffly replied, walking away from him and disappearing within the caves. Deep within Yagura, he could feel a small piece of his heart wither hearing that cold tone directed at him.

"Lord Yagura..." Daichi began, but Yagura held up his hand, unhappy with this turn of events. Moving towards the stairs, his mind was running a mile a minute from what had just happened- his incredible focus directed toward the group instead of Kiku's attitude toward him. Several possibilities ran through his head, and all of them depending on a single thing.

He had to tell Mei about this.

~~***~~

Utakata stood in front of the academy, staring at the dull cylindrical building with a mixture of feelings bubbling within him. After he'd gotten the location out of Kiri, Utakata's common sense (which suspiciously sounded much too much like Yagura for his liking) kicked in, nagging him about what he would say to the two. And therein lay the problem.

Utakata didn't know what to do- he'd spent most of his life evading his problems by being so rebellious, such as joining the Hunter Corps. He was barely able to relate with other people on an emotional level, let alone sympathizing with them. What the hell was he doing? He couldn't do this! He shouldn't even have to do this- Aramaki and Minoru were his _best friends_ , so if anyone could forgive him, it should be them!

He continued his silent vigil outside of the plain building, which was slightly hazy due to the eternal mist that hung around the area and gave Kirigakure its' very name, his internal battle continuing for some time.

"Fuck this." He suddenly said, lightly slapping his face (which he immediately regretted, as it was still sore from the giant grin he had had on earlier) and walking into the institution of learning.

Inside was nearly the polar opposite of the outside. Where the outside was a bland dull blue-white (which made it blend into the surrounding mist quite easily), the inside was a miasma of color. The walls themselves told of the rich history of Kirigakure and the Elemental Nations, mosaic-covered floors showing the great battles Kirigakure participated in during the Shinobi World Wars, murals of all the famous Shinobi Kirigakure produced (with entire blacked out areas where traitors and those that died dishonorably had once occupied), and entire walls dedicated to each of the Mizukage, showing them as they had been at their most powerful- the Shodai surrounded by the Seven Swords; the Nidaime standing proudly over Kiri with the very mists curling around his form; the Sandaime (his grandfather) sitting upon a throne of skulls; Yagura in a battle stance, with a bloody background of the Sanbi crushing Bloodline-wielders underneath its' feet; and finally the Godaime, who stood before a backdrop of a boiling volcano, the viscous mist emanation from the volcano forming Kirigakure. These were the Mizukage, the strongest and most revered in the entire history of Kirigakure. They represented the best of Kiri, the strongest, the brightest, and were the measure that all Kiri-nin held as they grew as Shinobi.

They represented everything that Utakata hated. They, who acted so selfishly in the name of making Kiri a better Hidden Village. They, who were responsible for the deaths of _hundreds_ of their own Shinobi in wars that barely meant anything. They, who led their followers in the prejudice of their predecessors concerning people with Kekkei Genkai and Jinchuuriki like him.

Granted, Utakata couldn't very well say any different of himself, having been the cause of several dozen of those deaths in the name of both his grandfather and Yagura. It was only a small condolence that those he'd killed had died quick, painless deaths- his personal mark on the ninja world. He'd taught Haku all that he knew about working with Senbon, including how to take down the target by inducing a state of false death, which was useful in bringing down more powerful Shinobi they'd rather capture alive than bring back in a body bag.

"Funny, I didn't think traitors were all for training new Shinobi." A voice called to him from behind, pulling him out of his nostalgic spiral once more.

_Really gotta stop doing that..._

"Hey, Minoru." Utakata cheerfully waved. "How you doing?"

"Pretty good, up until I saw you." Minoru cuttingly responded. Utakata sighed.

"Where's Aramaki?" Minoru crossed his arms.

"Why should I tell you?"

"Because what I have to say to you I want to say to the both of you." Utakata responded, walking up to his old friend.

"Whatever you have to say, you can say to me and I'll tell Aramaki later on." Minoru still didn't budge, his large form blocking the entire hallway. Utakata's eyebrow twitched.

"No you won't. You'll take what I say, twist it around, and present that messed up version of my words to him." Utakata replied, reaching into his sleeve. "This way is much easier."

"What are yo..." Minoru trailed off, the sedative-laced Senbon protruding from his carotid artery. Jumping over the massive form of the man, Utakata sighed as he dragged the larger man with him towards the classrooms. With the dosage applied and the size of Minoru, there was little doubt that the man would wake by the time he found Aramaki. The mild paralytic would allow him to- hopefully- leave their meeting without injury.

Prowling the hallways, Utakata listened for the subtle sounds of Aramaki teaching one of the academy classes. Where Utakata had gone the way of the hunter-nin, Minoru strove for the right to wield Kabutowari, which was left in the crypt of the previous wielder- as was tradition when one of the Seven Swordsmen died without naming a new wielder. The only exception to that rule was the "Greatsword" Samehada, which passed from wielder to wielder depending on who it deemed suitable to harness it.

Kouka Aramaki was, compared to his two friends, exceedingly tiny. Roughly the height of Yagura (who he himself came from a family of short people), Aramaki was suited for his skills in speed and agility, allowing him to be one of the few Shinobi on the entire continent to be able to effectively fight using Sealing. When Utakata had attempted defection, Aramaki had been fairly good at fighting with the generic seals (shock and explosive tags, chakra suppression and the like), and had just started studying the more complex- and destructive- kinds of seals. For him to attain the rank of Jonin on those skills showed he was a force to be reckoned with.

"...but that doesn't mean you can just do what you want." Aramaki's voice wandered in from around the corner, and Utakata sped up, the sedated form of his long-time friend slowing him considerably.

 _I_ must _be outta shape if I can't keep up my speed carrying Minoru of all people!_

Heaving Minoru's body over his shoulder, he staggered under the weight, silently vowed to work himself back to form, and was able to pick up the pace without as much resistance. Nearing the corner, Utakata turned it with sheer determination, heading towards the large training room where all academy students congregated and held daily Taijutsu competitions. In the whole building, it was the only place capable of holding the entire student body- and for good reason, as the floors of the spacious room were inscribed with seals that summoned all the occupants down into the caverns, where they would join the rest of the civilians in hiding if Kirigakure were to ever be invaded. Approaching the simple wooden door (with a picture of the Shodai as he went to war during the First Great Shinobi World War on it) and slid it open, shuffling inside as he listened to Aramaki continue his speech.

"As I said, Kirigakure is joining the other Greater Hidden Villages in a war, sending nearly all of our Shinobi forces." Once child, a little girl that bore slight resemblance to the Godaime ( _possibly a relative, though I doubt it's anything closer than cousin_ ) raised her hand, and Aramaki nodded for her to speak.

"But then who will protect the civilians? Even at the height of all three of the Wars, Kirigakure never sent out all of it's forces. There were always a large number of Shinobi in-village, including the Mizukage, for village security." Utakata slumped Minoru against the wall near the door and leaned next to the unconscious man while paying close attention to Aramaki's answer, of which he himself was also curious about.

"Well, the only ones not to leave Kiri are the Genin and select Chunin. They will be in charge of village security, with the elders acting in lieu of Lady Mizukage." He answered the girl, and Utakata was impressed with the plan. Most likely, the war would be so powerful that every other Hidden Village was doing the same, with the lesser villages being left to handle the missions that the Great Hidden Villages could not perform. "Any other questions?" No one raised their hand. " Good. Then you are dismissed. Please return to your homes and let your families know of this. We are doing everything in our power to ensure that the citizens of Kirigakure and the Land of Water are not drawn into this conflict. Your safety is our greatest concern."

The students left chattering amidst themselves, and Utakata ignored it for the most part, leaning against the wall near the door. Beside him, Minoru began groaning, sign that the sedative was wearing off, while Aramaki remained in the center of the auditorium, standing in the control circle, where he could easily summon them down into the caves.

"Aramaki." Utakata greeted.

"Traitor." He responded, back to the Rokubi container. Utakata simply snorted in response, hauling up Minoru with an ease he hadn't quite shown minutes earlier, tossing the half-conscious man towards the Jonin, who caught the giant- but slid back several feet from the force.

"Screw that." Utakata rebutted, "And tell me why you had Minoru act as buffer between the two of us."

"I did no such thing." Aramaki coolly retorted, and Utakata seethed inside.

"Cut the bullshit, Kouka." Utakata rarely got pissed, but when he did, he referred to the source of his ire by their family names. "Minoru's forgiving enough, but he turns to you for guidance, which is the only reason he'd ever be angry at me for doing what I did."

"So what, you just thought we'd welcome you back with open arms when you appeared before us?" Aramaki snapped, dropping the conscious- but paralyzed- Minoru onto the ground. "Fuck that. You'd have to be smoking Kusagakure's hallucinogenic weeds to even think for a second that we- that _I_ would _ever_ forgive you."

"I never pegged you for the type to hold grudges, Kouka." Utakata replied, resisting the urge to pull out several Senbon.

"I never pegged you as the kind of person who would attempt to kill the Mizukage." Aramaki responded, and Utakata was thrown for a loop.

"Attempt to kill..." He repeated, confusion marring his visage. "I didn't try to kill him, idiot!"

"That's not what reports were saying." Aramaki told him, hefting Minoru's weak form up. "Eyewitness accounts have you and a group of others- presumably Shinobi from rival villages, since none of their descriptions matched the roster of Kiri-nin- took on the Hunter Squad escorting the Yondaime along with the Yondaime himself. All of the squad sent with you were confirmed dead and the Sanbi was seen heading out into open water. Everyone assumed that the Sanbi's release had destroyed the Yondaime's body, and later reports of Akatsuki in the area along with a few witnesses saying they saw you and your associates die in a massive explosion."

Is that it?" Utakata asked, raising an eyebrow. "'Cause that doesn't sound like much of a reason from my point of view."

" _We thought you were dead!_ " Aramaki hissed, shuffling towards the door- and past Utakata. "Those reports of your death and the Sanbi's disappearance in conjunction with previous records of Jinchuuriki vanishing nearly had Kirigakure starting the Fourth Great Shinobi World War!"

"I didn't know." Utakata replied, stopping Aramaki in his tracks with his next statement. "I'm sorry."

"You're sorry?" He helped Minoru- who had gained enough mobility to use the wall as a crutch- through the doorway before turning back to Utakata. "You're sorry? For what? Defecting? Taking the Mizukage with you? Leaving us weaker than the other Hidden Villages without both Biju to back up our strength? What, pray tell, are you sorry about?"

"Leaving you."

"Leaving me?" Aramaki let out a dry, hollow laugh. "I tell you 'I love you' mere hours before you defect, and you're sorry about _leaving me?_ "

"Aramaki..." Utakata trailed off, watching as his one-time lover left him alone- a cruel role reversal, given they had left off with Utakata walking out and leaving Aramaki to pick up the pieces.

~~***~~

"...And they've already prepared raids on several clans." Yagura finished, standing across from Mei within the Mizukage's Quarters. It wasn't spacious or overly fancy, like others were known to be, but what it lacked in aesthetics it more than made up for in elegance. The entire room was set up so that all light came from the glass wall that circled the office, making appear open, and giving the impression that one was viewing the entire village with a bird's eye view. The Sandaime, in his venerable wisdom, had seen fit to expand the glass doors opening out to the tiny veranda into this display of elegance at its' finest. It was these windows that Mei was peering out of, looking over the misty form of Kirigakure with concern- concern, Yagura, noted, that was not without just cause. The stark contrasts between the Bloody Mist of old and the new, more peaceful Kiri were glaringly obvious to even the littlest of children. It was this dissonance that had made the Godaime's reign so hard- having someone with two Kekkei Genkai leading their village out of a period where most of the villagers- Shinobi and civilian- would slaughter her just to stay alive longer themselves had to be one of the more insurmountable challenges any Kage would ever face outside of war. Yagura could feel little sympathy for Mei, having 'led' Kirigakure into the genocidal period she had to bring it out of (something that he still felt furious about, despite the many times he had come to the conclusion that there had been little he could have done to avoid being placed under the control of Madara at the time).

"What should I do?" Mei asked him, sounding like a defeated general, and he thought it odd- voicing his thoughts aloud.

"Why are you seeking my advice?" Yagura replied. "You were able to bring Kiri back from its' single most bloody era, uniting both factions in a way I could not- a way I would never have thought. What little I've seen of the changes you've made are beyond anything I could have ever come up with. Take pride from that accomplishment, and use those skills now as you have done before."

"To do what?" Mei questioned him, turning to face Yagura. "There lies within the ranks Shinobi that would openly agree to wanting to kill bloodline-wielders; that have professed to having prepared to make raids against my clan, our kin and those that support our wellbeing the most. This faction of Shinobi- ranking from Genin to Jonin- has existed since long before my inauguration as Godaime, and you want _me_ to find the answer?"

"No." Yagura replied, stopping Mei's tirade in its' tracks. "I don't _expect_ you to bring Kiri together. I firmly believe that _you_ can unite Kirigakure much better than I could ever hope to. Not fully, but enough that people like that faction can understand that bloodline-wielders aren't the monsters they were made out to be."

"That was never questioned." Mei concurred. "However, it's the _how_ that I can't decipher."

"Perhaps, but the answer might be simpler than you think." Yagura cryptically informed her, moving toward the door. "Go about it a different way- see what you come up with."

"Where are you going?" Yagura stopped, his hand mere inches from the handle.

"Personal business." Yagura replied, just a cryptic as before. While he had not shown it down in the Underground, Yagura had desperately wanted to steer the woman he'd always been fond of- but too afraid to start a relationship with- back onto the right path. He'd fantasized about approaching her for years- ever since they were in the academy, fortunately separated from the horror of having to kill one another due to his apprenticeship with Kaito-Sensei. Sensei had always told him to go after her, to follow his heart, only for Yagura to be too late when he had finally built up the resolve- she had moved on and he was bound to be Uchiha Madara's 'pet'.

 _The time is now..._ He thought determinedly.

He would finally know for sure if Kiku liked him as he loved her.

~~***~~

Utakata headed back to the Mizukage's Manor, mulling over Aramaki's reaction to their relationship. He could still remember how it had started. It had been after Haku's 'death', and he was drowning himself in sake and similar drinks- quite literally, as Aramaki had gone to look after him and found Utakata unconscious with his head buried in a barrel of what was later revealed to be undiluted rice wine (a denser type of sake, with the capability to turn anyone that drank minute doses of it into a blackout drunk). That Utakata was found immersed in a barrel of it and hadn't been comatose- if only barely- was nothing short of a miracle. Of course, this was only learned after the fact, as Aramaki had begun performing CPR on him and had acquired a contact buzz strong enough to have the two of them wake up in bed together. That first time was awkward, and the both of them agreed never to speak of it- until Utakata's drinking problem had ended up with the two repeating their actions frequently. From that point, they had progressed into a casual relationship, hooking up every once in a while, but nothing definitive. Then, a year and a half later, it had evolved into something... _more_. They had moved in together, and Utakata had become known to spend all his free time with Aramaki. The two of them hadn't quite been open about their relationship, nor had they kept it a secret- it was best described as one of those relationships where nobody outside of the two in it really knew about it. However, when Aramaki wanted to have the two of them be more open, Utakata would have none of it- he'd barely been able to move past his grandfather's shadow at that point, and felt that people knowing that he was in dating a guy would put him back under the late Sandaime's shadow once more- so Aramaki had conceded, and the two of them continued their odd relationship in relative secrecy, meeting up whenever both were between missions. Due to Utakata's life in the Hunter Corps, their apartment, to him, was little more than a place where he could catch up on sleep and spend a few hours slowing down his life before it had to be sped up again. Those few days that came along every couple of weeks that Utakata spend in the embrace of Aramaki were fantastic, he wouldn't deny that, but he never really saw what the two had as anything more than casual. Sure, Aramaki was a good friend, but he wasn't the type of person that Utakata could see getting into a serious relationship with- let alone spending the rest of his life with.

Not like he could so easily see with Yugito.

With Yugito, it was like he couldn't see a life where he was _not_ with her. A life where they would adopt many, many children, as neither could conceive a child- the idea of a child borne by _two_ Jinchuuriki was not something he ever wanted to see. Ever.

Idly, he made a mental note to ensure that neither Naruto nor Fu could be capable of spawning offspring.

He doubted the world would survive.

...right, getting off-track.

His relationship with Aramaki was casual, and would be nothing more than that. He would remember the time they were together fondly, but that was it for them.

Utakata nodded to himself, sure in his decision. Now he just had to get Aramaki to see it as he did. He was so occupied with his thoughts that he nearly ran into Yagura, who was leaving the Manor.

"Yagura?" He asked, surprised at the smaller Shinobi's appearance. While he hadn't holed himself within the Manor ever since arriving in Kiri, Yagura hadn't exactly gone out of his way to go about the village like he used to all those years ago.

"Utakata." The silver-haired man replied, almost quirking an eyebrow up in curiosity. "Is there something on your mind? Surely you haven't grown so lax in your training that it becomes a hazard to be in front of you as you walk."

Utakata's eye involuntarily twitched at the jibe at his skills, intentional or not. Yagura's prim honesty had always caused problems when he was talking to other people. The number of people he _hadn't_ insulted in some form was shorter than the number of people he _had_ unknowingly insulted, thinking that he was paying them a compliment of some form. The only solace Utakata- one of the more frequent victims to Yagura's odd complimentary system- took from the whole affair was that Yagura had always required someone on-hand to ensure there wasn't an international incident of some sort from his backhanded compliments toward a Daimyo or fellow Kage. However, the downside was that Yagura had become... obsessed with manners.

Utakata had felt a chill travel down his spine the day Yagura had met the aid. He's regretted ever having taken joy in Yagura's plight since.

"You know as well as I that I'm not one to laze around with anything." Utakata replied, partly glad at having had learned how to evade the backhanded compliments. "And I'll tell you about what's on my mind when you tell me what's on yours."

He'd also learned that Yagura _never_ wanted to know what was troubling other people if he didn't have something troubling him as well.

"Mei's resolve as Godaime is being tested. There are a faction of devout followers of Madara's will within the ranks of Kirigakure Shinobi." Yagura confessed, having long since learned to not field Utakata's (or Kaito-Sensei's) questions when he wanted to know what was on Yagura's mind as well. "They believe my reign as Yondaime to be Kiri at it's peak."

"Damn." Utakata whistled. "Makes my problem seem small by comparison."

"Which would be?" Utakata silently cursed. He'd hoped that the redirect onto Yagura's troubles would distract from his own with Aramaki.

"Jilted ex-lover." Utakata replied. "Thought it was understood as casual by the both of us, but..."

"Ah." Yagura nodded his head. "I would give you advice, but I've never had any interest in seeking a relationship with another male."

Utakata gagged on his own spit, freaking out both internally and externally.

"You- you knew?" Utakata gasped out, pounding his chest to steady his heartbeat (it did _not_ also double as performing the Heimlich Maneuver for a simple wad of spit. Really, it didn't).

"A good number of the village knew." Yagura tilted his head slightly in a childish way of displaying confusion.

Utakata, meanwhile, was idly wondering if it was possible to die from choking on one's own spit.

"What?" He pounded out, once again slamming his fist into his abdominal area.

"Yes." Yagura confirmed, his head returning to that equilibrium it always held. "In fact, there were rumors of a betting pool concerning when either of you would learn that your relationship was so well-known. I seem to remember that the two of you were quite the talk of the gossip amongst the civilians and some of the Shinobi populace."

"Kill me now." Utakata moaned, no longer choking on his own spit, but holding his head in his hands and curling into a standing fetal position.

"The past cannot be changed, no matter how much we may wish it so." Yagura sagely provided, and Utakata didn't think he could ever feel any stronger a need to punch the man than that moment. "The woman I love is a part of that loyalist faction."

Utakata felt his anger fade at that revelation.

"You love someone?" Utakata couldn't believe his ears. Yagura was known within certain circles as the only Kage to not have family of any kind, having been the child of a small family that had died during a bad storm when he was three, and was so bad socializing that there were whispers that he would die without leaving behind any family- no wife, no children, no grandchildren, nothing.

"Munashi Kiku." Yagura clipped out, and Utakata winced at the sharp tone used. It was a tone that he had only used twice before- when the Sandaime had died, and when his Sensei had passed away.

"Does she know?" Utakata asked, knowing that he shouldn't be anything other than supportive of the torn man before him. Yagura's shake of the head in the negative made Utakata straighten up.

"Then you will tell her." The former Mizukage looked toward him in surprise, before understanding flitted across his face that turned into determination. "You will tell Kiku that you love her, and I will help Aramaki attain closure over our relationship. Neither of us will face the other until this has been done, and if we can't look at each other with the satisfaction of a job well done, then how can we be expected to face our family when we see each other again? How can we look at our reflections and not feel anything outside of regret and self-loathing?"

"You're right." Yagura replied. "Then let us go our separate ways. I to Kiku's house, and you to Aramaki's apartment."

They split apart, each on their own mission- one that they would not fail, no matter what.

~~***~~

Yagura stared at the simple house in front of him- the Munashi household- and looked at the door with a faint sense of trepidation. His stomach felt like it had been removed, and was replaced with a fish that was frantically searching for water, while his entire body felt hot and itchy.

He was nervous, something that hadn't happened since he was a young child entering Kaito-Sensei's clan compound for the first time.

_Damn it Yagura, you promised not only Utakata but yourself. Get going!_

With that single thought, he approached the door in front of him, reaching for the doorbell.

_DING-DONG!_

It sounded like a funeral gong, marking the passing of a great warrior. The baritone rumbles shook him to his core, and he felt his resolve start to weaken when the door opened.

"Lord Yondaime?"

~~***~~

It had sounded so simple- go to apartment, knock on door, enter apartment, proceed with apology. That was the theory, anyway.

In reality, it had gone more like- go to apartment, stand outside of door resisting the urge to just use the spare key to enter apartment, have Aramaki open door himself, take one look at Utakata, and slam door shut.

Which led to now.

"I just want to talk, Aramaki." Utakata yelled through the door, and he heard several thunks hit it, with the sharp points of Kunai poking out of his side of the door. "Throwing Kunai at the door will not make me go away."

More Kunai were thrown, and Utakata had to dodge them- and the chakra surrounding them. Watching as the Kunai lodged themselves within the wall opposite the door, Utakata turned to view an intricate Sealing array appear on the door, which began reforming itself around the holes made by the Chakra-enhanced Kunai, the entire Seal forming the kanji for-

Utakata's eye began twitching, and his fingers itched to respond with a volley of all the deadly weapons he had on-hand.

"While I _am_ impressed with your skill in Sealing to be able to manipulate the parameters of a Seal's form, I will _not_ , quote-unquote, fuck off." Utakata told the man on the other side of the door. He received more Kunai in response, with the Seals forming a new, but similar, message for him. "Again, impressed with your Sealing, but not leaving." Still more Kunai and slander. "Fine. If that's the way you wanna be, then you leave me no choice."

Utakata clasped his hand together, swinging the two-handed fist around a little to gain momentum before smashing it into the door.

The door, in response to this attack, exploded.

~~***~~

Yagura could feel his heart beating hard against his chest, and worried if it would burst from him in a dazzlingly morbid shower of blood, skin, muscle and bone. A part of him was screaming that this wasn't the time, that he wasn't ready, while the rest of him was entirely focused on silencing that small piece of him.

He had to do this. He _had_ to.

"Kiku." Yagura greeted, his voice far too calm, despite the inner turmoil he was plagued with. "May I come in?"

The woman, who wore a sleeveless gi underneath basic Chunin armor and a cross-cut skirt (much in a similar style to the Godaime's dress, Yagura idly noted), leaned against the doorway glaring at him. The hot and itchiness that had briefly gone away when Kiku had answered her door had resurged two-fold when she swayed her hips to the side, beckoning him entrance into her house.

"Thank you." He said, bowing slightly as he left his sandals by the door, following her into the sitting room. The Munashi family hadn't really been all that big or prestigious, having only gained the political pull due to the fame of Jinpachi- the greatest wielder of Shibuki there ever existed. Because of that, they lived in relative obscurity (though that was mostly due to the fact that there were only three others bearing the family name of Munashi, including Kiku than it was having a single member of the family gain fame), living modest lives as average Shinobi. Kiku wasn't an exception, her house elegantly simplistic, having little more than what was needed for her to live comfortably.

"It's no bother." Kiku replied, waving off the show of respect and getting to the point. "Though if you could tell me why you're here? I have to go aid with the preparation of the carriages before reporting to the Mizukage for protective detail of the Water Daimyo."

"You're on the guard?" Yagura asked, silently impressed with the woman's accomplishment. Looking at her from the corner of his eye as he sat down on one of the cushions surrounding the table, he briefly saw the spunky little pre-teen girl that he had been so enamored with in the academy, and marveled at how much she had grown up.

"Yeah." Kiku replied, drumming her fingers against the table. "Now, if you could please let me know why you're here? You may be the former Mizukage, but that doesn't exactly give you the right to mess up my impeccable timing."

"Right, sorry." Yagura apologized, though he could barely comprehend the reason for doing so- Kiku had always been one of the few subjects where he couldn't use logic to describe or converse about or with. "I just came to tell you that the Godaime now knows about this little rebellion of yours."

"WHAT!" Kiku's nails etched deep lines on the lacquered wood, marring it. "Why would you do that?"

"Because every single decision you think I made while as Yondaime was never mine." Yagura explained, his internal turmoil calming down considerably as the conversation steered back into more familiar waters. "They were those of Uchiha Madara, the mastermind behind Akatsuki and the reason we're in this war."

"You're lying." Kiku protested. "Uchiha who? I've never even heard of that person!"

"And for good reason." Yagura noted. "He was supposed to have died fighting the Shodai Hokage. Do you remember the story of the creation of the Valley of the End in the Land of Fire?"

"No. What's that got to do with this? Why did you leak our plans to the Godaime? And why tell me about it?" Kiku was confused and angry- and for good reason, Yagura regretfully noted.

"I'm getting to that." He patiently told her. "The Valley of the End was created when Uchiha Madara declared war against the Shodai Hokage and Konoha. The reason for doing so is unknown- perhaps he was angry at not being named the Shodai? Maybe he held a grudge against the Hokage? That part of the story has been lost to time, so we can only provide conjecture at the reasons behind his actions.

"The fight involved one of the Biju- Kyuubi." Yagura continued. "It nearly proved to be the downfall of the Hokage, had the man's wife not stepped in and sealed it within herself, giving him the advantage to win the fight.

"However, Madara did not die that night as everyone thought he did. Rather, he kept on living, a mere shell of his former self. He kept on living, planning and plotting the downfall of Konoha. Somewhere down the line he decided to conquer the world- again, only he can tell us what led him to this decision- and chose to begin with the one place that could potentially prove his downfall- Kirigakure."

"What?"

"You see, nearly all of the Kekkei Genkai have come from a Child of a Jinchuuriki, and with it a deep blood connection to the Biju that is nearly impossible to sever. With that connection, those clans could use it to free the Biju, which were an important piece of his grand plan."

"Why?" Kiku asked, and Yagura took a moment to consider how he should answer that.

"He'd read of an ancient tale involving a man that became a god, and the beast that would go on to become the Biju- the Juubi.

"The Juubi, or Ten-Tails, was a horrible creature, emitting a chakra so foul that young children could feel it from the other side of the continent- and this was in the days before people could use chakra. The man that would go on to become a god was the Sage of Six Paths."

"But he's just a legend!" Kiku burst out, and Yagura raised an eyebrow.

"So you know the story." It wasn't a question, but Kiku nodded anyway. "Though you may not know that the Sage was real, and he became the Shinigami upon his death."

"How?"

"Who but the gods can comprehend their plans?" Yagura asked in return. "The empty body of the Juubi was said to have been sealed forever within a massive orb of earth and sent into the sky. The Moon.

"Madara learned of this story, and made it his plan to bring the Juubi back together, becoming it's Jinchuuriki and casting an eternal Genjutsu to be reflected from the Moon down onto the Earth."

"How do you factor into this story?" Kiku asked, glancing at the clock behind her.

"Simple." Yagura replied. "I hold one of the pieces of the Juubi."

"The Biju are parts of the Juubi."

"Yes." Kiku had always been whip-smart. It had been one of the things that Yagura had always liked about her. "And by controlling me through a Genjutsu, Madara could orchestrate and lead the Bloodline Purge from the safety of the shadows."

"But when did he put it on you?"

"That assassination of the Sandaime." Yagura told her.

"Your scar..." She trailed off, having really taken in the absence of what had become such an integral part of Yagura's campaign against Bloodline-wielders for what it meant. "It was from Madara?"

"It was how he was able to control me without needing to be near me." Yagura told her. "From what I understand, he set up some kind of blood seal on the injury, keeping it from healing- and allowing him full control over my body. I was a prisoner in my own body."

"That explains why you told the Mizukage, but not why you told me." Kiku contested, and Yagura looked away from her inquisitive gaze.

It was now or never.

"Because... I love you."

~~***~~

Utakata glared at the door, his hands full of an assortment of Shuriken, Kunai and Senbon.

The door just stood there, unscathed from his many attacks, the glowing Seal-kanji mocking him.

First it had exploded, sending out a fireball that Utakata was barely able to avoid getting hit by. He'd retaliated by sending his own weapons at it.

Then it had started deflecting his weapons back at him.

And each time it deflected his weapons or shot a fireball at him, that Seal-kanji glowed, almost like it was alive and taking joy in his suffering.

He glared at the door.

_Damn you Aramaki..._

~~***~~

"You what?" Kiku was shocked at the revelation. She hadn't really known Yagura before he was known as the Sandaime's gofer, only having some faint memories of a quiet boy in her academy class that had disappeared some time before their last year at the academy- and the graduation test.

"I've always liked you, ever since we were in the academy, and watched you from afar." Yagura confessed, and Kiku could hardly believe her ears. Here was the most feared Mizukage since the Shodai, and he _loved her_? "I was glad when I heard you had managed to graduate, and followed your Shinobi life. Even during my early days as Yondaime, I still loved you, and your personnel file could always be found on my desk. When I'd heard that the Sandaime had taken ill, I began to think about my own life, and the things I regretted most- like how I never told you how I feel every time I see you; how my stomach would suddenly feel like it was replaced with a squirming fish; how my mind just completely _blanked_ whenever you were near. I had made my decision when I set out to see the Sandaime in his dying days- when I returned to Kiri, I would tell you everything; like how, even in the academy, I always looked to you for guidance if I was confused by a subject; how I nearly stalked you, wanting to know everything I could about you. But we both know what happened on that trip."

Kiku was barely restraining herself from gaping at this point. He loved her? And... damn near stalked her- for months, if not years, if what he was saying was true. And what precedent did he have for lying to her like this, if he wasn't?

"Ever since I lost my freedom, I vowed to tell you... everything, would be the right word for it, when I got it back." Yagura let out a dry laugh as he continued. "But the circumstances of gaining my freedom left me very few options concerning you."

"But why _now_? Why when we're days away from starting a battle that we may end up dead by the end of?" Kiku asked, her previous needs as a Shinobi pushed to the side for the time being.

"It's _because_ of that war that I'm telling you now." Yagura confessed. "This war is so that I and my kin can live our lives in relative peace- and I want you to be there with us. With me."

"Yagura..." Kiku breathed, momentarily forgetting to add the title of 'Lord' to the man before her who was baring his heart to her. Who was _offering_ his heart to her.

"I know we won't be able to have children, but that doesn't mean we won't be without family." Yagura continued, and Kiku heard something that probably nobody had ever heard before- his voice becoming hoarse from the growing lump of unshed tears. "So, I ask shall ask this but once, as I fear I will lose control if I must continue. Will you marry me?"

"I barely know you." Kiku weakly protested, though Yagura shook his head and offered her a small smile in return.

"Do we really need to know each other to be in love?"

"This is too much." Kiku said, much more strongly than before. Yagura reached out to comfort her, but she recoiled from his touch. "Leave."

"Kiku." Yagura's voice was strained, and he tried to reach to her again only for her to shove him back.

"Leave." She repeated, her voice holding an undercurrent of anger.

"But..."

"LEAVE!" She screamed at him, shoving him towards the door. He complied, replacing his boots and standing in the doorway.

"I'll leave you be for now, but I'll come back later." Yagura called over his shoulder, before he left Kiku in the empty, silent house. Outside, rain began to fall, hiding Yagura's tears from the world.

~~***~~

Aramaki stood resolute, listening with a morbid sense of satisfaction as the-selfish-asshole-formerly-known-as-Utakata tried to enter his apartment. There was a string of curses before a small explosion was heard, followed by an even _louder_ string of curses. His lips twitched upwards as he deduced that the bastard had just sent an explosive note at his door- which had sent the blast back at the attacker with the added strength of its' own defensive fireball as the driving force.

Oh, how he loved his front door.

When he had been studying the less common details of Seals and Sealing, Aramaki had come across the theorem that the layout of a seal could be altered into any shape- within reason, of course, as too much alteration would lead to an overlap in Sealing kanji that would drastically change the nature of the Seal. To test this out, Aramaki had used his own front door to test it out, using the kanji for 'fuck off' due to the simple idea that anyone that would attack his door probably deserved the insult. He'd been scared of the Seal becoming a dud from the changes (as, contrary to popular belief, Seals usually did not work if done incorrectly. Sure, there was the occasional deadly explosion, but that was exceedingly rare), but had been elated when it was tested by Minoru and held up. Essentially, it was meant to use the ambient chakra in the atmosphere to fuel itself in regrowing the door, sending out a fireball (which was just a glorified Sealing scroll combined with an explosive tag, most of the legwork being done by the controlled release of the explosion- which was made possible by a Restriction Seal), and as an added bonus- mostly for kicks, as Aramaki may not have been altogether sober at the Seal's construction- the Seal itself would become visible and glow whenever it was attacked.

Which, given how the asshole's swearing was getting louder, longer and much worse, had the added bonus of a psychological attack as well as physical.

It wasn't that he hated Utakata it was just... no, wait, it _was_ that he hated Utakata. And for good reason too.

It had all started several years previously, when Utakata's latest student in the Hunter Corps 'died'- Ao had told Aramaki that the student was the mystery Yuki child Zabuza had had with him when he'd attempted to overthrow the Yondaime. Aramaki had been one of the few to have been disclosed of that fact, as any knowledge of a Bloodline-wielder infiltrating Kiri's elite to that point would cause rioting in the streets and more attacks from both sides. He wasn't one of those perverse few that took pleasure from the murder of those with Kekkei Genkai, but neither was he the insensitive kind of person who would tell their best friend that their student had been a traitor. He'd gone to console Utakata- and figure out how to gently break the news to his friend- when he'd found the hunter-nin with his head in what he'd learned too late was undiluted rice wine. From there the night was a blur, though several key parts stood out in his memory, as clear then as they were now- such as his being 'intimate' with Utakata. The both of them had agreed to never speak of it, but Utakata's grief over losing his student had led him to drinking again and again, with Aramaki going after him and the two of them ultimately ending up in bed together. This had led them to concede to be little more than "friends with benefits", as Utakata had put it. They'd stayed that way, until Aramaki began to feel something... more in their relationship. He'd suggested that they move in together, and they began spending more and more time hanging out together outside of missions- almost like they were dating. Aramaki had gone to his old neighbor and confidante Kiri, who had told him that he was falling in love.

He'd laughed in the man's face.

But then he thought about it, and could see the qualities that made Utakata attractive- he was an oddball, but not annoyingly so; he knew a lot about human anatomy, so he was very creative in bed; Utakata, in his own way, was very caring of Aramaki's needs along with the needs of others, making him almost chivalrous.

Looking back, Aramaki could see those endearing qualities with the eyes of a scorned lover, and saw little else outside of a selfish man who was very creative in bed.

Getting back on track, Aramaki could remember when he'd told Utakata that he'd loved the man. It had been as he was leaving to guard the Yondaime as he went to renegotiate trade with the Land of Hot Water.

A day later, reports began filing in- the Yondaime attacked, the Sanbi released, the Rokubi Jinchuuriki MIA, the entire guard detail missing, presumably killed.

It was one of the few times Aramaki was scared out of his mind, and was one of the many listening in as the entire story became known: Utakata seemed to have defected, and enlisted the help of several Bloodline-wielders to aid him in fighting off the Yondaime, only for the fight to prove too much for the Yondaime, who seemed to have died using the Sanbi's Yokai. Later that day, Utakata was said to be in the nearby port town when someone wearing a black cloak dotted with red clouds appeared and fought him off-shore, resulting in a huge explosion that nearly took out the docks of the port.

Search teams were sent out in the area the Sanbi was last seen at, but the lone Akatsuki was seen having come from that direction. It was presumed that the partner was allocating the Sanbi while the person seen atop the giant white seagull was taking down Utakata for the Rokubi. Both the Yondaime and Utakata were listed as dead, and the Sanbi and Rokubi lost to the Akatsuki.

Aramaki had drowned his sorrows in the very drink that had begun his and Utakata's relationship, receiving dozens of comrades and colleagues sympathies.

That was three years ago.

Three years of moving past Utakata and all that he had stood for. Three years of rebuilding his life from the ground up. Three years of regaining what he had had before, while building upon it and becoming Jonin.

Three years of personal growth, all torn asunder by the return of the man he had once loved- still loved, though not as much as he had thought he did.

So he'd tried to play off their relationship as though it hadn't existed when news of Utakata's return with the Yondaime spread through Kirigakure. And it would have worked too, had he not nearly lost it when the Rokubi Jinchuuriki appeared before him and Minoru during their daily lunch at that tea place- Akebino's (the very same Akebino that bore Akebino Jinin, famed wielder of Kabutowari). Instead of playing it off, Aramaki began to feel hatred for the man that had sat opposite him, regaling the two with the basic story of what had happened to him those past few years. Hatred the grew with each word that came out of the bastard's mouth, until he couldn't take it anymore. He'd seethed in his anger, and when Utakata had briefly left to relieve himself, Aramaki had turned to Minoru, who'd practically _felt_ the waves of anger and hate roiling off of the smaller man. He'd answered truthfully, explaining his original plan up to the pure anger he'd felt at Utakata, and Minoru simply nodded his head, saying that if Aramaki hated the man, Minoru would stand behind him one hundred percent.

Which led him back to the present, with Utakata trying to get into Aramaki's apartment (he refused to call it _their_ apartment, having spent the better part of six months throwing the habit) in the feeble hopes of getting the Kouka to bleed his anger dry.

Obviously, Utakata had forgotten that the Kouka family were notorious for being stubborn as hell.

Aramaki gazed at his door with smug satisfaction, knowing that it would take nothing less than a skilled attack on the entire door-frame to bring it down.

Which is exactly what happened next.

The door flew through the apartment, upending the coffee table and several chairs before clattering to a stop near the far wall opposite the doorway. A dragon of water followed the door's path several feet into the apartment before dissolving into a thick mist that spread out, flowing out of windows and into vents until there was no evidence of the water dragon ever having been made aside from the ruined door laying in the entryway to his little kitchen. From the doorway stepped Utakata, pocketing a small flask before laying eyes of Aramaki, who was frozen in his chair at what was once the end of his coffee table (the door having missed clipping him in the side by mere inches). Utakata straightened up, rolling his neck before strolling to sit in the sole chair at what would have been the opposite end of Aramaki's coffee table in a manner that would have suggested that smashing in doors was an everyday thing for the former hunter-nin.

"So." Utakata breathed out, looking eerily creepy. "You wanted to talk?"

It was this exact moment that Aramaki realized just how screwed he was.

~~***~~

The rain was a light drizzle, commonplace in the Land of Water, yet it fell with an intensity rarely seen since the days of the Nidaime's rule. All around him, people, civilian and Shinobi alike, were furiously working to ensure that the wagons and carriages- and their contents- were kept dry. Nothing that was exposed to the elements, living or not, was safe from the chill that came with the rain. Children ran past Yagura, heading towards one of the many rivers that passed through Kirigakure to play games in the tumultuous waters. Games like water tag- where the one that was it had to chase the rest throughout the water, deeming the one that 'It' had caught while they were surfacing for air 'It', starting the game anew (it was only won when only one player was left that hadn't been deemed 'It'.

Yagura watched them move past him, remembering when his own classmates and the neighborhood kids had played water tag- without him, of course. Never with him. He was just too skilled in the water (a result of the Sanbi being sealed in him, he later deduced). Granted, he'd never really wanted to play games, but the fact that they had never once asked him stung nonetheless.

Seemingly walking without aim (as any Shinobi that became a veteran Jonin was skilled enough at instinctively knowing where to go that they almost never paid any attention at all to their surroundings until they deemed themselves to be where they needed to get), Yagura deftly avoided the group of children as they nearly ran into him, and was brought back to reality when the children stopped moving once they'd seen him. Slowly blinking his eyes, Yagura briefly wondered why they were frozen on the spot when he remembered. He was the Yondaime, the feared ruler of the Bloody Mist, the man that singlehandedly slaughtered dozens, if not hundreds, of Bloodline-wielders. Why shouldn't they fear him?

The answer was simple.

"I'm not going to hurt you." Yagura would have rolled his eyes if he didn't think it the wrong approach to changing their view of him. "And the nearest river is around that corner up ahead and to the left two blocks. Can't miss it."

One of the children, a brown-haired boy with almond eyes, was the first to break of the trance, bowing so deeply that he was in danger of losing his balance and slamming his head on the ground.

"Th-thank you." The boy told him, before slowly grabbing his friends, shaking them of the self-induced paralysis, and within moments they were off again, running down the street.

"Remember, to the left and the straight two blocks!" Yagura called out to them, allowing a half-smile to grace his features before turning back to the matter at hand.

He'd misinterpreted Kiku telling him to leave, mistakenly thinking it to be her telling him to leave and not return. He'd shed tears until the rational part of his mind kicked in, berating him for having cried over Kiku needing space to let it sink in. Yagura would have slapped himself if it wouldn't have looked strange. The best thing for him to do right now would to leave Kiku be, and let everything sink in on its' own. He could not interfere- doing so would make it worse, both for him and for her.

This was the one part he _hated_. He _never_ liked having anything be out of his control, however little control he had. As far back as he could remember, Yagura wanted control- control over his chakra, over Sealing, over Sanbi, over Kiri. It was both his greatest asset and his largest flaw, in that he always changed or altered everything in sight to achieve the desired goal.

_Thankfully Kaito-Sensei pounded some sense in me..._

Moving back on track, Yagura pushed his reflections of the past aside and continued his trek through the rain, his lack of a protective cloak making itself known with every sharp sting of the rain on his skin, soaking through his shirt and drenching his muffler, the extra weight of the water marginally slowing his speed as he moved through the streets back to Mizukage's Manor. Kiku would know where to go when she finally decided to seek him out.

It was a waiting game, the one game that Yagura played so often- and so well.

The one game that he never lost at, whether he wanted to or not.

And this time he so very wanted to lose, consequences be damned.

~~***~~

Utakata sat across from Aramaki, who was frozen in place, his cup of tea still halfway tipped to his lips as he just stared at the slender man in front of him.

"So," Utakata began demurely. "Where shall we start?"

Aramaki said nothing; did nothing.

"How about we begin with why I left and how it turned you into a selfish asshole." Utakata continued, his voice sounding all-too-mocking for it to be serious, yet it was contradictorily so.

Aramaki still did not move, and Utakata absentmindedly flicked a Senbon into Aramaki's shoulder, causing a muscle cramp that relaxed all muscles from that point down on the arm. The teacup clattered down onto the ground, spilling its contents onto it's former holder, who hissed as the hot liquid soaked through his gi and clung his undershirt to his skin.

"See, I'd always been planning to leave." Utakata explained, still sounding demure. "It had nothing to do with you, or our long-term fling."

"Fling?" Aramaki finally spoke, clutching his shoulder around the area the Senbon was stuck, not having enough medical knowledge to safely remove it. "A fling? Over three years of dating, sex and living together and it's just a _fling_?"

"Not once did I ever say we were a serious thing." Utakata argued. "I made my stance on it as clear as I could, You can't fault me for that."

"Oh please, like that matters." Aramaki waved it off. "What matters is if you're going on dates with someone, living and sleeping with them, then it's a relationship, not a " _fling_ "."

The last word was spit out with such venom that Utakata briefly worried about getting hit with some of the fictitious 'deadly' substance.

"It was a fling if neither of us took it seriously. It was a fling, nothing more." Utakata calmly retorted.

"It wasn't to me." Aramaki growled out.

"I apologize if I mislead you in any way for you to believe that, but, to me, it was little more than a fling. A long-term, extensive fling, but a fling nonetheless." Utakata apologized.

"Screw you." Aramaki shot at him. Utakata shrugged in response.

"An intriguing offer, but no. I've found the person I want to spend the rest of my life with." _This_ threw Aramaki for a loop.

"What?"

"Yeah, her name's Nii Yugito." Utakata explained, his eyes glazing over as he recalled everything about her. "She's a skilled Kunoichi, extremely cute, and knows how to maim people in the strangest ways."

"Nii Yugito?" Aramaki repeated, shell-shocked.

"Uh-huh." Utakata nodded, the glazed look in his eyes spreading to his entire face. Coming out of his shocked state, Aramaki took a good look at Utakata as he continued talking about Yugito, and could feel his rage dissipate at the look Utakata had.

It was similar to the look he had, years earlier.

It was love.

But it wasn't the same kind of love Aramaki had had. No, this was much more intense, yet seemed so impeccably fragile. The odd contradiction of intensity and frailty left Aramaki deeply humbled. Whatever he had felt, compared to what was before him, wasn't love. At best, it could be described as fondness, but never in a million years could what he had felt be anywhere near as close to what Utakata was feeling right now, and suddenly Aramaki understood. He had been angry for little reason, thinking his own selfish thoughts about why Utakata left him, and was completely and utterly wrong. Utakata hadn't left because of him, he'd left because they weren't meant to be together.

And the odd part was, it was true.

Aramaki, after Utakata had left, had grown much closer to Kiri, and the two had just begun dating. He idly wondered if he would feel what his friend was feeling for this 'Yugito' person with Kiri, or if there was his own soul-mate (in the figurative sense, as such a thing occurring in the real world was foolish) waiting out there to find him. He didn't know, but he desperately hoped it was true.

"I'm sorry." The words escaped his lips before he could really comprehend his course of action, and was left in the dust as his mouth seemed to run of its' own accord. "I'm sorry for being so selfish. All this time, I thought it was just that you didn't want to commit, but I see the truth now. I see that you have found the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, and it isn't me. Was never me." He took a breath, the rest of his body catching up to his mouth. "I see that now, and would like to offer my gratitude in steering me down my own path, one that I hope will lead me to the same thing you have now."

Utakata snapped out of his reverie, giving Aramaki a hard-line stare. Aramaki held firm, sure in his decision. The stare turned into a scowl that was mimicked by the person in the opposite chair. Both men glared at each other, their expressions worsening with each passing second until the both of them smirked, and Utakata started chuckling.

"That's nice and all." He began in response. "But hows about we deal with your selfish actions from the past few days first."

"I apologized." Aramaki dryly quipped. "What more do you want?"

"Not to me." Utakata replied. "To Minoru."

"What? Why?"

"You know how he is." Utakata told the smaller man. "He's way too softhearted to really hate any of his friends. This past week must've been killing him inside, to hate one of his oldest and closest friends."

"I've always found that ironic, given his life's dream." Aramaki mused, putting his hands on his legs and pushing himself into a standing position. "Outside of Chojuro, there's never been a softhearted wielder of any of the Seven Swords."

"The times are certainly changing." Utakata agreed, standing himself, before punching Aramaki in the face. "Now go apologize to Minoru, you jerk."

"Oh, _I'm_ the jerk?" Aramaki growled picking himself back up off of the ground. "You go gallivanting off to who-knows-where without leaving so much as a hint that you're alive for three years and _I'm_ the jerk?"

"Yes." Utakata deadpanned.

"It's good having you back." Aramaki chuckled. "These past few years were getting pretty boring without you here to cheer us up."

"Well, if this war ends as it should, then you may have to get used to life without me." Utakata told him.

"Huh?" Aramaki elegantly responded.

"Yugito's from Kumo, and I don't really want to go back to my old life." Utakata fondly smiled. "I rather like my life right now, with that crazy family of mine."

"Huh?" Aramaki said again, watching dumbly as Utakata crossed the apartment, picking up the downed door.

"Don't worry, you'll meet both my family and Yugito when we meet up with the other regiments from the other Hidden Villages. If you're lucky, you can test your Sealing skills with Yagura's student. Gaara's gotten pretty good from what little I understand." Utakata crossed the room, door tucked underarm, before putting it back into place. "I think the two of you would get along pretty nicely."

"..." Aramaki said nothing, opting instead to watch as Utakata experimentally swung the door a few times.

"Anyway, I've got places to be, people to see, so I'll be going. Don't forget to apologize to Minoru!" Utakata called out to him as the door shut, leaving Aramaki in the ruins of his apartment in silence. Outside, the rain began to increase from a drizzle to a full-blown storm.

"...What the hell?"

~~***~~

Yagura and Utakata stood to the side as the village elder (the oldest man in Kirigakure, having been the Nidaime's younger brother and sole living record of the entire history of Kirigakure) left the antechamber, moving out onto the balcony overlooking the village. Beside them, Mei was adorned in the official robes of the Mizukage, the indigo hat hanging down her back from a string of leather that was looped around her neck.

"You sure about this?" Utakata asked her, and the woman merely nodded in response, her eyes like hardened pieces of jade. "Alright."

"Lady Godaime." Chojuro stuck his head in from the doorway the elder passed through. "They're, um, ready for you..."

"Thank you, Chojuro." Mei complemented the young man, who blushed slightly at the praise. "You head back out. I'll follow in a second." She turned towards Yagura, but he spoke before she was able to fully open her mouth.

"You don't need my thoughts of this matter. I'm no longer the Mizukage, and any advice you need from me you've already got or know." Mei closed her mouth, nodding, the slight hesitation she'd shown no longer their, replaced by pure determination. She left, leaving the two to their own devices.

"You're wrong." Utakata commented, walking in tandem with Yagura to the doorway, where they stood just before the entrance. "You've got a lot of things she would need to know to be the Mizukage."

"I know." Yagura replied, staring at the Mizukage as she stepped up to the podium at the edge of the balcony. "But all that stuff, it's the kind of things that a leader, a great leader, needs to learn. Nothing I could teach her can ever be taught."

"So you believe she can change Kiri for the better, then?" Utakata asked, leaning against the doorway in an all-too-casual manner.

"She has potential." Yagura diplomatically stated. "What she's done to better Kiri in the past three years is more than I could ever have hoped to have done, and she's still quite young."

"She's no older than you." Utakata deadpanned. "Stop acting like an old man."

"She has her whole life ahead of her." Yagura continued. "Decades to make Kirigakure a Hidden Village to be feared for it's might, not it's reputation."

"Seriously. Stop."

"I doubt I'll be alive when the time comes for the naming of the Rokudaime."

"I'd hit you if you weren't capable of killing me several times over. Stop."

"..."

"...thank you." Utakata shifted into a more comfortable position against the door-frame. "I forgot to ask in all the excitement. How'd it go with that girl- Kiku?"

"We talked." Yagura tersely answered. "She heard my side of the story, and I explained what I could. She asked to be left alone, and I've not gone back since."

"Smart move." Utakata nodded. "It's better to let her seek you out in this kinda thing."

"And what of you and Aramaki. Are the two of you back together?"

Utakata was barely able to keep himself from choking on his own spit. Again.

"No, we're not." Utakata replied with conviction. "I told him that he was being selfish, and gave my side of the story. Can you believe that prick thought I defected because he told me he loved me?"

"...I believe I lost that part of the bet." Yagura responded. "I had you pegged for 'eternal denial', and him for several months later than that."

"...you suck."

"So you are friends again?" Yagura changed the subject, though Utakata still seemed to seethe in anger.

"Yes." He ground out. "We're friends, and he's gonna meet Yugito when we get back together."

"You do understand that she never mentioned that she was single."

"...I'd hit you if you didn't scare me."

"I wasn't aware that I was... _scary_." Yagura looked at Utakata with a dark look in his eyes, and an unsettling smile on his face. "If you would be so kind as to expand upon that?"

"No." Utakata felt a chill run down his spine when he looked at Yagura. "I'd very much like to leave Kiri _without_ injury for once."

"I make no promises."

"Fine by me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> such a long chapter. so much worldbuilding put into it. 
> 
> next time, roshi and han have family issues that need sorting out.


	28. Recourse

Roshi moved through the crevasses between the rock spires that made up the back alleys of Iwagakure with the precision garnered from years of practice. Absentmindedly, he bounced from spire to spire, moving almost haphazardly through and around the spires as they became less like spires and more like towering mansions interconnected by stone bridges. Behind him, half a dozen figures moved through the shadows of the spires, chasing him. The figures zigging and zagging in and around the domiciles with skilled precision, gaining ground on their target. Roshi, upon noticing that his pursuers were gaining ground, began using everything around him to slow and even stop them.

Complex Earth Release jutsu usually meant for large-scale attacks and destruction were drastically robbed of their efficiency by minute amounts of chakra being pushed into them. Jutsu that would normally create huge pits, towering walls and vast swamps were instead making tiny pitfalls, unexpected ledges and mud-slicks. The pursuers, being skilled Shinobi, were largely unfazed- until the smallest of the group was tripped up by one of the ledges. Without skipping a beat, the largest of the group stopped atop one of the houses and swung a weighted iron ball on a roll of ninja wire towards the falling figure, who twisted in the air until their hand was twirling the iron ball around their wrist. Using the momentum from their fall, the diminutive figure swung towards Roshi, flying higher and higher in the air until the weighted ball reached its apex, where the figure released their grip around the weighted wire, flying higher still into the air. The figure arced in the sky, angling his descent _just_ so, landing atop Roshi, pressing the older man into one of the earthen platforms and halting his movements long enough for the rest of the group to catch up and fully detain the red-haired man.

"It would be best if you stopped trying to run." One of the figures said, stepping forward to reveal their position as leader of the group.

"I'm not _trying_ to run; I _am_ running." Roshi replied, glaring at the imposing figure.

"I wasn't aware that running entailed being trussed up by half a dozen Jonin." The smallest of the Shinobi stated. "Though the details on just _what_ you're running from are admittedly vague."

"Why don't you ask the Tsuchikage? I'm sure he'd jump at the chance." Roshi venomously replied. The young Shinobi shook his head.

"You know as well as I that Grandfather, for all that he's straightforward, can just as easily live up to the title of Kage." The child replied.

"He's a stubborn old coot and you know it!" Roshi retorted as he was tossed over the shoulder of one of the Shinobi.

"Tell that to his face when we deliver you to his quarters, then." Another of the Jonin said, shaking her head at Roshi's antics. The rest of the group, save the youngest, balked at her suggestion.

"What makes you think I haven't?" Roshi smirked predatorily.

The Jonin, as one, choked on their tongues.

"Uncle," The young Shinobi sighed, moving to aid the choking Jonin. "Why must you do such things?"

"Eh, I get bored." Roshi shrugged as much as he could in his bindings.

~~***~~

Han ambled through the dark halls with slow purpose. He was surrounded by empty bookshelves, their contents relocated to the Archives- his home. Being the Jinchuuriki of the Gobi, it was his life's goal to protect the Archives from anyone and anything at all costs. Ever since he could remember, his life revolved around the Archives. Living there, prowling the halls, all he knew was the dim lighting of the lanterns, casting shadows upon the many scrolls and books that occupy the Archives. The monotony had only been broken by the near constant visitations of his family- something he had usually despised. All that time he'd spent alone had left him rather preferential to being on his own. That preference had made itself known in the distance he kept from most of his family (the exception being his siblings, who were much too stubborn and caring to allow him to grow _too_ distant). It was this very introverted nature of his that had led to his current predicament.

Ever since he returned to Iwa, Han had (unsuccessfully) tried to bond with his family. Whenever he had tried to be friendly to his sister or her family, they were visibly unnerved by his actions. He was by no means under any illusions as to why they acted like that- he was known by both his nephew and niece as the distant uncle they rarely saw, and while she hadn't been quite as bad as the others, Tokine only knew him from when he was a young child, before being carted away to the Archives to defend them as the third Gobi Jinchuuriki, and Kitsuchi...

Han chuckled darkly as he remembered Kitsuchi's fear of him from back when Tokine first learned of her betrothal to the man. He'd been quite bothered by the large gathering of friends to commemorate the occasion and had, on a drunken dare from Roshi, stood over the shoulder of Kitsuchi and made a subtle death threat along the lines of "if you harm Tokine in _any_ way, I will show you just how easy it is to get lost in the Archives. And trust me when I say, if you 'get lost', you will _never_ be found."

Kitsuchi had become ashen and had nearly had to seek aid from the nearest medic-nin.

It was the most fun Han had had in years. Too much fun for him to not send death glares Kitsuchi's way every time they crossed paths. It had made the Hellish experience known as Tokine's wedding completely worth it.

Granted, none of that helped him right now- What he needed was not fond memories of the past, but something to help him make new memories to look back on when they set out to war in two days. Even if he and Roshi somehow weren't deployed into the battlefield, their family were. And, having grown up as a weapon during the Fourth Great Shinobi World War, he knew that not all of them would make it out alive. It was now or never.

Which was why he was stalking the dark halls of Iwa's old archives. The familiar surroundings calmed him, providing solace where others could not. It would give him the time needed to think and figure out the best way to reconcile with his family, instead of throwing caution to the wind and making it up as he went along, like Roshi often did.

~~***~~

While Han was prowling the old Iwagakure archives, Roshi was preparing to throw caution to the wind and improvise like a bat outta hell. One of his personal rules for situations like these were to make a dignified entrance- the old shrew was finicky about those kinds of things.

Being unceremoniously dropped down in front of the Tsuchikage while hogtied was a large loss of face, but he could roll with it.

"I'm glad you could make it." Onoki intoned from atop his throne. Out of all the five Kage, the Tsuchikage's Throne was the most ostentatious of them all. The throne was, quite literally, a monster. A giant stone statue in the likeness of a dragon stood guard over the Tsuchikage, its barbed tail curled around the raised dais while the spiked head glared down at the room. To either side of the dragon were twin serpentine dragons, twining out from the wall and ending with their heads on either side of the throne, teeth bared in identical snarls. "I almost thought that you weren't coming."

"Are you kidding?" Roshi laughed, shifting his bound form into a sitting position. "Like I would try to skip out on you."

"Really?" Onoki asked, floating up from his throne before disappearing and reappearing right in front of Roshi. The sudden movement had the red-head of you falling backwards onto his back in a failed attempt to distance himself from the perceived 'intruder'. "Would you like me to recall each and every time you ducked out of your responsibilities?"

"I never shirked any of my duties!" Roshi barked.

"If that was true then you would never have left your post." Onoki growled. "I just don't understand it, though. You were head of the Explosion Corps and top choice for Yondaime. I had so many plans for you and you wound up being such a great disappointment."

"I did those things out of obligation, nothing more." Roshi stated, shimmying around back into a sitting position as far as he could get from Onoki. It was a prudent move when the air became suffocatingly thick with Killer Intent emanating from the Sandaime.

"Simple obligation?" Onoki snorted. "Simple obligation does not allow for you to abandon your post and traverse across the Land of Earth under the false pretenses of 'studying the Biju'. Obligation is not becoming tantamount to missing-nin for over _five years_."

"Ah, about that." Roshi chuckled. "Funny story. See, it was originally supposed to be a couple weeks, but the sheer _freedom_ of it all, of not having any expectations to live up to, was too tantalizing to give up."

"And none of that had anything to do with my preparing to make your installation as Yondaime official?" Onoki asked rhetorically.

Roshi at least had the decency to look abashed for a moment before fixing Onoki with a serious gaze.

"I never wanted to be Yondaime."

"You are Shinobi of Iwagakure." Onoki, despite his short stature, seemed like the greatest presence in the room at that moment. "To serve your Tsuchikage to the best of your ability is what you and all other Iwa-nin strive for. No less will ever be accepted of anyone that hopes to wear a Hitai-Ate from this Village."

"Not with my family." Roshi growled. "My sister married off to your son, Han cursed to spend his life down in the Archives, and me sentenced to lead the Explosion Corps like the previous Yonbi Jinchuuriki."

"I knew the man that founded the Explosion Corps personally, and it was his dying wish that all Yonbi Jinchuuriki that follows him grow to lead the Explosion Corps." Onoki intoned. "He was a great man, and you would do best to follow his will."

"And what if I don't want to do that, huh?" Roshi retorted. "What then?"

"Insubordination." Onoki blithely replied. "At best."

And what's the worst you can do- kill me?" Roshi snarled.

"In point of fact, yes." Onoki answered, flying back to his throne. "You will be detained and the Yonbi removed."

"You can't do that." Roshi sounded fearful.

"Foolish brat. I am Onoki of Both Scales. I always get my way." Onoki darkly replied as, with a wave of his hand, Roshi's bonds were cut. "Now, go clean up and meet me at the Precipice in one hour. I expect you not to be late."

"Not always." Roshi muttered, rubbing his arms to regain his circulation faster. Louder, he said. "Don't worry your senile head. I always keep my appointments."

~~***~~

Han tipped his new hat- a kasa similar to the one he had when serving the Archives- down to limit the bright light as it shown down on him. Lowering his arm, the metallic clanking of his steam armor drew the attention of the nearby civilians, who watched with amazement as he sped off away from the oft-unused Iwa library at speeds only Jonin and select Chunin could perceive. With each and every one of his movements, the armor circulated steam into the apparatus from all throughout itself.

While it wasn't completely imperative to his life, the steam was an important part of his life nonetheless. An odd side effect of the sealing of the Gobi into himself was that he began to produce large amounts of steam from his skin. The steam, to him, was completely harmless, while to others it was like a mild acid, burning and cutting any creature it came in contact with. It also responded to his will, curling around him and often making others perceive him as little more than a ghostly specter within the steam, much like Gaara and his sand defense. Unfortunately, the price of having the steam was that it made him quite emaciated to the point where he required aid to do anything more than sit upright. To that end, the Tsuchikage had a team of medics and mechanics design and build for him a suit of armor that would allow him to move about freely of his own accord. In addition, he could now come into contact with other people without having to control the steam and keep it from running wild, as it gathered all the steam he emitted and stored it within the mechanical urn attached to his back. It went without saying that the armor was altered as the years went by, improvements being made and puberty striking him (which everyone involved absolutely hated, as the random growths spurts had ultimately called for the addition of telescopic limbs that allowed for a certain measure of growth until new armor needed to be made- the mechanics having gotten angered over having had to make new armor as soon as the previous version was completed, including one notable time when the measurements changed well into the making of the newest armor and involved a bout of temporary insanity and a new team of mechanics being brought in).

He half-noticed that he'd reached the spire Tokine and the rest of his family lived in. Coming back to present, Han stopped in the middle of the catwalk connecting the spire with one of the cave entrances leading into the cliff face (Tokine lived at the edge of the village as her own personal declaration of independence) and moved with precision, aiming towards the stone door that held the target of this trip. Knocking on the door, he waited for someone to answer. This late in the afternoon, there were at least two people he could start to reconnect with. Han didn't have to wait long.

The door opened.

Tokine (no last name, as none were ever given in Iwa- the belief being that a title mattered more than any family name ever would) was a slim figure with shoulder-length honey-colored hair and inquisitive green eyes that could instantly make anyone spill their innermost secrets. All in all, she looked like the picture-perfect image of a mother.

Which made her perfect at being Iwagakure's top interrogator.

"Han." The tone is clipped, and not altogether welcoming.

"Tokine." Of course, he's had the better part of two decades to hone curt tones into perfection. "May I come in?"

"I'd rather you didn't." Tokine responded. "Your actions are quite off-putting."

"I know." Han replied. "Human interaction was never my strong suit."

"You would know." Tokine scoffed.

"I don't understand." Han said. "Here Iwa is about to partake in a war and I merely wish to know who my family is. What is so unsettling about that?"

"Oh, I don't know." Tokine replied sarcastically. "None of my children know you outside of old photos from when we were children, Kitsuchi's deathly afraid of you, we've never spoken to each other in nearly twenty years, the list goes on."

"Trivial matters easily overcome." Han waved dismissively with an armored hand that left a slight hazy contrail in the air.

"Your armor." Tokine states. "How many people- good, innocent people, have you killed because of that _thing_."

If Han were any less of the man he was, he would have cringed at the sheer hatred she harbored at the Gobi. Before the sealing, she had been almost like a second mother to him. But after the sealing, after witnessing Han unintentionally killing both of their parents, Tokine had resented him. She'd buried that hatred deep within her for several months, acting the role of supportive older sister as he drifted away from their small family, until the day came that he was to be assigned his permanent role as guardian of the Archives. On that day, the two of them had come to blows, and wound up barely speaking to each other (and was the only time Roshi would ever openly admit being scared).

"That is irrelevant. What matters is-"

"So then you _have_ murdered innocent people." Tokine interrupted.

"We are Shinobi." Han states as if it is the answer to everything. "Can you not say the same of yourself?"

"That is beside the point." Tokine rebutted. Han snorted.

"If your killing innocent civilians is irrelevant, then so is mine."

"That was different. I had extenuating circumstances-"

"And I did not, is that what you're getting at?" Han rarely got angry at family, but Tokine was pushing it. He rapped his armor with a closed fist. "Does this not count as extenuating circumstances?" He unlatched his left glove from the armor, pulling it off and freeing his hand. "Does this not count?"

Tokine shrieked and jumped backwards as Han stepped into the home, holding his hand up. Pale an withered, it looked little more than skin and bones with the barest hints of muscle and sinew being there, almost visible through the dull skin. The blood vessels closest to the surface of the skin pulsed with Han's heartbeat, sending out tiny wisps of steam with each pulse.

"This is what it is, isn't it?" Han says with dawning realization. "You're scared. Scared that what I did to Mother and Father will happen to you. Scared that I would destroy everything in your life if I remained as entrenched in it as I was."

"Wouldn't you!" Tokine screamed at him. "You were five when you killed them, so you wouldn't remember, but Roshi was eight and I was twelve when it happened. And we remember it perfectly. _I_ remember it perfectly. Mother and Father had gone to see you after the sealing when you started emitting that horrid steam. It surrounded them and I was lucky enough to get to watch personally with Raiga."

"Raiga?" Han asked, the name familiar but he couldn't recall why.

"Don't tell me you don't remember your older brother?" Tokine asked, raising a single eyebrow. "He practically raised us after you murdered Mother and Father."

"I do not recall such a man." Han mused thinking back to his childhood.

"Of course you wouldn't. You were taken in by the Tsuchikage and taught basic control over that steam of yours before being shipped out to the Archives. We rarely saw you since then." Tokine explained. "Raiga died on a courier mission when you were ten, and we never brought him up since."

"...I never knew." Han whispered.

"Why would you?" Tokine clipped out. "Now, I would greatly appreciate it if you left my house."

"No." Han replied, clipping his glove back onto the armor. "I have not finished the business I set out to do when I came here."

"I don't care. Leave." Tokine's voice became slightly more emotional.

"I told you, I cannot." Han restated. "I am waiting for your family to return."

"No, you aren't." Tokine became more forceful. "You are leaving and will never return."

"I will not." Han intoned.

"Then why? Why won't you leave?" She was clearly annoyed.

"Because if I leave, then I fear I will never be able to say that I ever knew any of you if" ( _When_ , his mind silently adds) "any of you die in this war."

Tokine is silent, and simply says nothing as she moves back towards the open door (giving Han as wide a berth as she could) and gesturing towards it.

"Then leave."

"I can't." Han said again.

"Can't or won't?" Tokine retorted. "As far as any of us are concerned, you're just a distant colleague. You never knew any of us at all."

"We're family, Tokine, you and I. How can you just-"

"You were never any family of mine." Tokine interrupted. "Now please leave my house _immediately_."

"It seems that moniker of yours is all too true. You really are a Heartless Maiden." Han said, standing up and moving toward the door. He stopped briefly beside Tokine. "Am I really the monster you make me out to be, or have you grown so twisted that you became the very thing you accuse me of?"

"Goodbye, Han!" Tokine growled, slamming the door closed.

~~***~~

The Precipice was the highest point of all of Iwagakure. It was a lone stretch of rock that hung over a deep pit whose inky depths betrayed none of its secrets- nor the secrets of those sentenced to death within, for it was an execution place above all else. The only times the Precipice wasn't being used for an execution was the inaugurations of the Nidaime and Sandaime. The Nidaime's inauguration was a short, quick affair due to it occurring the later days of the First Great Shinobi World War, while the Sandaime's happened well into the Second Great Shinobi World War and as such there was barely any inauguration at all.

"You know, you didn't really have to threaten me to get me here." Roshi groused as he was led by the diminutive Shinobi from earlier. A firm yank on the ninja wire to his bound hands was his only response. "And you certainly didn't have to tie me up."

"Really?" The boy replied dryly. "So when I finally found you, you _weren't_ poring over a map of the Elemental Nations and muttering about the quickest way into the Land of Lightning?"

"...Damned kids." Roshi muttered under his breath. Raising his voice he said, "I don't want to be Tsuchikage, that's all. Your grandfather just won't listen to me, Shirotsuchi."

"He knows and fully understands that you are not capable of being Yondaime." Shirotsuchi replied, pulling Roshi further up the stone path.

"...He what?"

"At least, that's what I've heard from Kurotsuchi, but I suspect she's pulling my leg." Shirotsuchi sighed. "Sister's been so angry with me ever since I joined the Explosion Corps, even though she's still in training to join. I just don't know what her problem is- she'll still officially become a member within six months. _What_ I or Kentaro-Taicho did to anger her I'll never know."

Shirotsuchi continued ranting about the injustices of Kurotsuchi and her ire at the Explosion Corps, but Roshi was barely listening to it.

_I'm free._

The thought wasn't a new one for him, having become something of a mantra for the first months he was away from Iwa, but it now held new meaning. His lifelong obligations towards Iwagakure- specifically the Sandaime- no longer needed to be upheld. He was free.

_I'm free._

He wasn't needed to lead the Explosion Corps- Kentaro, his old Fukutaicho, was now the leader, proving that the Corps _could_ , in fact, operate without the Yonbi Jinchuuriki leading it. He could now do whatever he wanted with impunity.

_...Free. I'm free!_

And best yet, Onoki had given up on-

_Wait..._

Onoki _never_ gave up until he got what he wanted. The greedy bastard was famed for it- he personally led the campaign to secure the Archives after the failed march into the Land of Fire with the first Gobi Jinchuuriki. There was no chance he'd ever cede defeat and let Roshi not be Yondaime.

Immediately, Roshi began to think up reasons for his being called to the Precipice- it was either Onoki's speech to the populace describing exactly what they were facing in this war (why would it be? Tradition had it occurring the day they were to set out for the Land of Lightning, and Onoki had always been a traditionalist) or it was the Sandaime letting the populace know of who was to be Yondaime should he die at any point during the war- with the Tsuchikage-elect being present himself.

_Shit!_

Dozens of possibilities of escape crossed Roshi's mind in microseconds and were scrapped just as quickly. By the time a full second had passed, he had come up with a battle plan. Drawing on his reserve of specialized chakra, Roshi's saliva is quickly replaced with a pool of lava. Spitting the lava onto his bindings, the wire was quickly eaten through and his hands freed. Finally allowed the freedom to make hand seals, he quickly made the subsequent seals necessary in creating a mud clone while maintaining the wire tension required for him to appear to still be bound. From the ground around him, a mound of dirt began to appear, moving at the same brisk pace as Roshi while growing taller and more defined in shape until a mirror image of him appeared and started walking beside him. Roshi allowed himself a miniscule smile as the clone sidled to towards him; freedom was mere seconds away.

The clone exploded.

When asked about it later, Roshi would vehemently deny ever having emitted a high-pitched shriek.

"Any attempts to avoid this will not be tolerated." Shirotsuchi said as he stepped over the remains with the kind of poise and grace that was found in few children of eleven-years-old.

"I don't know whether to be appalled that my prodigy of a nephew is such a stickler for the rules or proud that you caught me _before_ the switch was made." Roshi replied in something akin to amusement as the Shirotsuchi on the end of the wire that bound him broke apart into a formless pile of mud. Instantly his gaze sharpened as the mud leveled out and was soon indiscernible from the ground around it.

_A mud clone, huh..._

He should have expected it, really. Kentaro, when the two of them had crossed paths since Roshi's return, had alternated between tearing him a new one and gushing over the sheer genius of the Jinchuuriki's nephew. Given that he hadn't seen the boy since the child was eight-years-old and was (very, _very_ reluctantly- Tokine was scary when she really wanted to be) put under the tutelage of Kentaro. From what he'd been told, Shirotsuchi was one of those rare generational prodigies like Deidara had been (granted, the Explosion Corps and Blast Release didn't exactly exist before Iwagakure was established over 60 years previously so there wasn't much of a precedent for those kinds of things). The fact that Shirotsuchi was skilled enough with his chakra that he could properly use Blast Release at his age (when the youngest anyone displayed any talent for it was Deidara at 14) proved that he more than earned his place as a member of the Explosion Corps.

_He really is a prodigy..._

Roshi allowed Shirotsuchi to bind him once more, figuring that anyone capable of catching him before he made the switch with a mud clone had more than earned his cooperation.

~~***~~

Han stood in the alcove nearest Tokine's house, watching it forlornly. He knew without a doubt that Tokine meant it when she said that she wanted nothing to do with him, but he wondered if she really meant it when she said that her family- that Kurotsuchi, Shirotsuchi and Kitsuchi- wanted nothing to do with him. Kitsuchi- the two of them had always had a bit of a strained relationship, but that was mostly due to Han's actions than anything else. Shirotsuchi didn't know him at all and Kurotsuchi, for all her rebellious nature, was closer to Roshi than she was him. To them, he was a stranger butting in on their life instead of a wayward family member come home.

And that hurt like nothing he'd ever felt before. It felt like a Kunai had wedged itself against his heart and was pressing against it every chance it got, taunting him with a death that would have felt more merciful than had he been left to suffer this, this- there were no words that could accurately describe what he felt. What little solace he got was that the pain let up whenever he was thinking of building bridges to his family- with Tokine's family. Tokine might have burned the bridge between them, but the ones with her husband and children had yet to be made. That being said...

"Hello Kurotsuchi." Han spoke aloud to the teenager that appeared beside him. "Come to deliver a message from your mother?"

"No." Kurotsuchi sounded much less surprised than she did at the beginning of the week. Han, having frequented the Archives as its protector, had become an impeccable Sensor-Nin, perhaps one of the best out of the entire Elemental Nations- unlike most Sensor-Nin, Han did not need to actively concentrate to use his chakra-sensing capabilities to their fullest. "I spotted you and wanted to know why you were _here_."

"Oh?" Han hummed, crossing his arms. "That is a question better suited for your mother than I, I'm afraid."

"What makes you think I haven't already asked her?" Kurotsuchi snorted. "And for the record, she was less than forthcoming, so you'd better have some damn good answers for me."

"Your mother does not like me." Han replied. "She does not want me to connect with any of you."

"What'd you do, kill somebody?" Kurotsuchi asked askance.

"Our parents." Han answered.

"Oh..." Kurotsuchi trailed off, and the two lapsed into silence, both feeling that they should say something, but not knowing what. "Is that why Ma never talks about Gram and Grampa?"

"She was no older than your brother when it happened." Han told her. "And she's never forgiven me for it."

"If you don't mind my asking, why do you want to connect with us?" Kurotsuchi queried. "Your tour in the Archives ended several weeks before you went missing and you never made any attempts to be a part of the family before. What changed?"

"I suppose I did, in a way." Han mused. "I was never very sociable until I learned to be these past few years. Before, I preferred to keep my distance from others unless I had no choice in the matter- Roshi was the only one I could tolerate being around for any period of time."

"But..." Kurotsuchi could feel there was more to the story, and gently prodded Han into continuing.

"But it wasn't until after I returned to Iwa, when I was... defeated by this Akatsuki," Han ground that last part out through clenched teeth- the blow to his ego that that loss had been _still_ haunted him. "that I met a strange child by the name of Uzumaki Naruto. He was a Jinchuuriki like me, but was unlike any other I'd heard of. He had this strange ability to garner faith in anyone that ever met him. Most Jinchuuriki that you hear and meet don't really wish to befriend others, but Naruto singlehandedly brought together a group of Jinchuuriki."

"Is that so strange?" Kurotsuchi tried to recall what she had been told of Jinchuuriki when she was younger and in Preparatory.

"Of course!" Han gazed at her searchingly. "We Jinchuuriki, by nature, are loners. We neither want nor need aid of any kind from anyone else- the corrosive nature of Yokai coupled with the large-scale destruction we are capable – and expected – of on the battlefield precludes anyone from joining us when war breaks out. Off of the battlefield, no one wants anything to do with us, so we learn from a young age that we want nothing of them as well. However, it is lonely both shunning and being shunned by society. Where there are hundreds of thousands of people, there can only be,at most, nine Jinchuuriki at any one time. It is this loneliness that is twisted and warped into resentment towards anyone that doesn't claim to be Jinchuuriki as well."

"But then, shouldn't Jinchuuriki want to be together?" Kurotsuchi asked. "Wouldn't it be better for you to remain with people that understand what you're going through?"

"You'd think, but no." Han chided. "Jinchuuriki are weapons of war and have always been treated as such; have always thought of ourselves as such. The presumption that, on the unlikely event that we were to be brought together, a kinship would form, is, in theory, preposterous."

"Why?"

"The perfect Shinobi is said to be the perfect weapon, having no bonds to anyone else of any kind." Han paused and looked out at Iwa in the fading light of dusk. "We are thought to be living examples of a perfect weapon, us Jinchuuriki. We learn from a young age to abandon such petty emotions in the hopes that it will better our lives. We have no bonds of any kind outside of the loyalty to our Hidden Village. We are bred, in a way, to live and die in battle against the enemy, the pets of our Hidden Village." Han turned to look at Kurotsuchi once more. "Would you not say that to be a Jinchuuriki is to be a perfect Shinobi?"

"I..." Kurotsuchi faltered, clearly uncomfortable with the topic they were discussing. "I should get going. Lil' Shiro's on an in-village mission right now, so Ma's trying to wrangle a full family dinner- including Gramps and Uncle Roshi."

"Give them my regards. I shall remain here until nightfall." Han's voice was seemingly disinterested, but Kurotsuchi thought she heard a bitter tone hidden underneath it all.

"I will." She quietly replied. There were things that he had said – truths that she now knew – that insisted that they be proven true.

She intended to bring out as many of the family's skeletons as she could with what Han just told her. She was going to play a large part in ensuring that this broken family was mended, no matter the cost.

~~***~~

The Precipice wasn't nearly as ostentatious or spectacular as any other patch of land that made its way into the history books of the Elemental Nations. It had no statues of famous participants of a battle decades ago, held no tactical advantage for one nation over another- it was simply the highest cliff face overlooking the entirety of Iwagakure, the acoustics of the mountains making it the prime location for the village-wide announcements. However, it's true purpose was much darker in nature- it was the place where traitors and prisoners of war were executed. It was the best – and only – place where Shinobi prisoners could die without any political repercussions simply due to the strange nature of the rock in the cliff that seemed to absorb any chakra it came into contact with like a leech, making anyone that tried to save themselves only futilely grab onto the rock with false hopes of using their chakra to be able to slow their descent meet with nothing in response. It was a place of death first and foremost.

Roshi felt much like the few POWs that had been found too dangerous to release, being led to their deaths. Yet, instead of death, he was being led to Onoki and a future as Tsuchikage- a position he neither wanted nor needed.

The man in question was standing several feet in front of Roshi, back facing him. Roshi sighed, figuring that since he made it this far, better to go all the way.

"Hey there, Onoki." Roshi waved foolishly, knowing that the man couldn't see the gesture. "I'm here just like you wanted me."

"So you are." Onoki sounded distracted, disturbing Roshi in the man's inattentiveness. Neither made any inclination to move, so they stood in silence, Shirotsuchi having moved out of earshot (but within eyesight of Roshi) to give them some privacy, until Onoki spoke up. "Do you know why I chose you to be Yondaime?"

"No. You never explained your decisions." Roshi replied.

"Maybe it's time I started." Onoki sighed. "I'm getting old." Roshi coughed, biting back the many remarks at the blatant statement. "I feel it in my bones that this war will be my last just the same as I did all those years ago when I chose you."

"But Iwa wasn't at war back then."

"No, we weren't." Onoki said. "But I've lived through all three of the Great Shinobi World Wars, and because of them, I've since learned that so long as these Hidden Villages and their Shinobi exist, so will war."

"You don't know that." Roshi contested. "Humans, by nature, are competitive creatures. This competitive nature is what gave birth to Shinobi, to the Feudal Lords, to all of this." He stepped up next to the elderly man and waved an arm out at the village. "War existed long before the Hidden Villages, even before the time of Shinobi, and will continue to exist no matter what. That's just how it is."

"'That's just how it is'?" Onoki snorted. "I never thought you to be so pessimistic."

"I'm a pragmatist, nothing else. I don't do any of that existential crap." Roshi growled.

"Don't be impudent, boy. I am still your elder." Onoki groused. "Besides, I still haven't told you, have I? The reason for picking you to be Yondaime?"

"That's right..." Roshi mused, rubbing his beard. "So why don't you stop stalling and tell me already!"

"Because you were exactly what Iwa needed."

"Huh?"

"I am a relic of a bygone era, I know that. My place as a position of power has long past. I am no longer the spry young Shinobi that I used to be, despite working so hard to retain my ability long past my prime. You, however, have a long life to live, being only the second Yonbi Jinchuuriki. You are the only person capable of taking the mantle of Tsuchikage, as neither of my grandchildren are yet ready."

"Just how far ahead have you planned?" Roshi asked, incredulous at how certain the man was that everything would go as wanted.

"Far enough." The answer was vague enough that it scared Roshi. "But what's important is that you become Yondaime."

"I already told you I don't want-" Roshi exasperatedly began only to be interrupted by Onoki.

"The title of Tsuchikage is not one you want. Neither I nor Sensei believed ourselves to be the best choice for it until we were inaugurated. It isn't until you find yourself the leader of an entire Hidden Village, the single Shinobi that all others look to for guidance and orders, that you realize," Onoki took a deep breath, revealing to Roshi the world-weary Shinobi that the elderly man truly was. "You were chosen not because you were the strongest Shinobi but because you were the one they looked to for guidance- which is what being a Kage is about, first and foremost."

"Really?" Roshi was a little skeptical- which was to be expected, as what Onoki was saying ran counterpoint to what everyone was taught from the older generations.

"Don't underestimate me, boy. You're four decades too young and haven't lived through three wars."

"You're the _only_ Shinobi still in active service that's lived _and_ fought in all three wars." Roshi muttered dryly. Onoki ignored it.

"I chose you because I saw that you were popular among villagers and Shinobi alike." Onoki stated. "You have a good head on your shoulders, boy, but you lack the experience to properly use it."

"...Thanks." Roshi deadpanned, figuring that it was yet another of Onoki's insulting compliments. The man, for all that he was one of the stronger Kage, had yet to actually differentiate between his derogatory comments and his compliments. "Humbled as I am, I doubt that, after all this time, I'm still the best choice you could make for Yondaime."

"I feel that I must agree with you, just this once." Onoki curled his lip slightly in distaste. "Now come. Tokine has... invited the both of us to dinner."

"She can be quite intimidating." Roshi agreed, following Onoki as he turned away from the Precipice. "Out of curiosity, who's your new choice for Yondaime?"

"Kitsuchi."

"Ah." Roshi nodded diplomatically. "And does he, uh, _know_ that you've chosen him as your replacement?"

"I'm telling him during dinner."

Barely seen by either person, Shirotsuchi was doubled over nearby, holding in the laughter as he imagined his family's reaction at the news.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter marks the beginning of the Konohagakure arc.


	29. Konohagakure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Naruto and Fu arrive in Konoha, to a less than warm welcome.

The gates of Konoha weren't nearly as tough and impenetrable as they seemed. That wasn't to say that they were incapable of keeping out enemy Shinobi, simply that they served more of an aesthetic purpose than anything else. Their grandeur appearance served as the primary purpose of their creation, impressing a positive appearance of the village to Daimyo, clients and fellow Shinobi. To that end, there was a tiny shack set just inside the gates where at least one Chunin (and the occasional Jonin) was placed during the daytime, registering and cataloging clients and visitors.

Hyuga Hinata was the one chosen to be 'gate guard', as the position was jokingly known as, to mark her promotion to full Jonin when a lone ANBU – a long-haired woman wearing a feline mask – appeared to announce the approach of the Godaime, returning from the summit. The Kunoichi faltered for a second before mentioning that there would be two emissaries from the Land of Iron with her. Hinata inclined her head slightly to indicate she understood, and the ANBU returned to the post marking the edge of the Barrier.

In the three years since having her heart crushed by Uzumaki Naruto, Hinata had undergone a vast change. She was no longer the meek little Genin, but a strong, confident Jonin and heir-apparent to the Hyuga Clan, having beaten her younger sister into submission upon her promotion to Chunin nearly two years previously. Since then, Hanabi had been marked with the Cage Bird Curse Mark and Hinata was taken in by her father for training. That training had since paid off and she was well on her way to replacing her father as clan head. Hinata was brought out of her musings by the approach of four chakra signatures.

In the distance, four figures appeared on the dirt path leading to the gates, two of them easily recognizable as the Godaime and her teammate, the Toad Sage Jiraiya. Of the other two, Hinata had to activate her Byakugan to see them clearly. They appeared to be two teens around her age, an olive-skinned girl dressed in a flared shirt with a bodice wrapped around her chest and a flowing skirt that didn't trip her up (which was quite a feat, as the young woman was barefoot and the skirt went down to her ankles) with pupil-less violet eyes accented by teal-colored hair that draped down and covered her shoulders, and a blond boy with vibrant blue eyes and-

Hinata's heart skipped a beat.

There was only one person she knew who had those whisker-like birthmarks.

Uzumaki Naruto.

Except it couldn't be- Uzumaki was locked up in South Ward of Konoha hospital- which held those few Shinobi that snapped under the pressure and were highly dangerous, both to themselves and others. She had learned the true nature of South Ward from her second cousin, Ko, who was regularly stationed at the hospital (as the Byakugan had long since proved invaluable towards ensuring that injured Shinobi didn't try to check themselves out without authorized consent), had decided that Uzumaki deserved it and that was that.

Unless... the Godaime had lied, and Uzumaki hadn't been restrained within the South Ward. But that didn't make sense- why would she hide Uzumaki away?

Hinata quickly banished those thoughts from her mind- the specifics didn't matter at that moment. What really mattered was why Uzumaki wasn't locked up, as he should be.

"Hinata?"

The use of her name, especially with such an unfamiliar voice, brought her attention to the very object of her thoughts, which took a darker turn once she realized-

It really was him.

No one else had that shade of blond hair, those wide blue eyes that seemed so curious, so trusting.

Except they weren't, not really.

"Uzumaki." She did her best to ensure that every ounce of her hatred towards him was felt in that single utterance of his name.

All of her hatred towards him, because he deserved nothing less.

~~***~~

Naruto stared at the gates leading into Konoha with a mixture of trepidation and mild disgust. On an intrinsic level, he knew that one day he would have to return to that place, but the rest of him was anxiously wanting to delay that return- after all, what did he have there to return to? Friends that most likely hated him after all that he'd said about them, a former Jonin-Sensei that he'd antagonized into trying to attack him, a life as the very thing Namikaze condemned him into- the perfect living weapon, having all the powers of a Jinchuuriki _and_ Child without the deadly and destructive consequences, but with a flawed seal that would kill him long before his ability as a Shinobi would deteriorate.

But ultimately, Naruto knew that the day would come that he would have no choice but to return, to face the consequences of his actions.

For some time after his banishment, Naruto had tried to feel _something_ \- some form of guilt or regret about what he'd said, only to come to the conclusion that, although he knew what he said and did was wrong, he just couldn't bring himself to _know_ that it was wrong. It was only after his connection to Kyuubi was removed that it really sunk in- he had alienated every single person that had seen _him_ , really truly saw Uzumaki Naruto instead of the fox brat or an incarnation of the Biju. While he did want to try to make amends, he didn't want to do so by returning to his old life- the one he had now with Fu and Gaara and the others was better than he could have imagined. They'd made an effort to get to know _him_ , personally, instead of simply knowing him, the Shinobi. They were more than just close colleagues, they had become his friends, his confidants.

They had become his _family_.

They _were_ his family.

Nobody he knew in Konoha could say the same.

Looking back, Team 7 couldn't even be given the title of 'family'. They were much too different, too involved in their own lives to ever have been called 'family'. It wasn't until the failed mission to retrieve Sasuke-

_Shit._

He had completely forgotten.

In the three years since he had faced Sasuke in the Valley of the End, he hadn't quite put much thought into the fact that he'd failed his promise to Sakura, nor how all of his former friends would react, especially-

"Hinata?"

And there, sitting in the little shack near the gates, was Hyuga Hinata. She was dressed in the traditional Jonin attire- long-sleeved shirt and the accompanying flak jacket- looking at him in shock.

_Why- oh, right..._

He was supposed to be locked up in Konoha.

And then Hinata fixed him with a glare that could freeze fire.

"Uzumaki."

There was so much hate put into that single word that Naruto took a step back in surprise. This was not the quiet, weird Hinata that he knew, but an entirely different person.

"You are supposed to be mentally unstable, locked in South Ward of Konoha hospital." Hinata continued.

"Well, about that..." Tsunade began, laughing lightly. "Funny story, really..."

"Konoha's abandonment of me is hardly a funny story." Naruto cut across, not wanting to have to repeat the painful story for each of his old comrades. He wanted this week to be over with as fast as possible, and wanted to leave Konoha in the least painful way possible.

"Do you know this woman?" Fu interjected, looking at Naruto concernedly, and he was reminded that there was someone with him that didn't have the past that he did. Didn't have the problems that he had. Wasn't entering Konoha with the stigma that he had.

"Once, a long time ago." Naruto replied, rather vaguely in Fu's opinion.

"I am not the person that you knew." Hinata hissed at him. "She died. Years ago."

"Oh." Naruto... wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. This entire affair with staying in Konoha was proving to be both awkward _and_ painful. Mostly for his former friends.

"You killed her."

Scratch that. Awkward _for him_. Painful for everyone else.

"...Ah-huh." He let out a strangled sound, his attempt at a noncommittal response, as an excruciatingly uncomfortable silence fell upon the group.

"You still have yet to explain yourself." Hinata broke the silence, drawing attention back upon Naruto.

"Ah, well-" Naruto started hesitantly.

"He will explain everything at a later time." Tsunade interrupted. "For now, I am Hokage, and I need to prepare a statement to the village." She motioned to the forest behind the group, and the feline-masked ANBU reappeared. "Send word to all out-village teams. Full recall."

"Lady Godaime?" Cat (at least, Naruto assumed that was the codename of the ANBU) hesitantly asked.

"NOW!" Tsunade roared, startling everyone present as Cat vanished in a gray-black blur. "Jiraiya, we need to seek audience with the Daimyo and his coffers."

"On it." Jiraiya vanished as well, though he wasn't a blur to untrained eyes- a testament to his skill.

"Now, let's go!" Tsunade vanished in what amounted to the faintest of blurs, with Naruto and Fu moving to follow- only to find Hinata barring their way.

"I cannot allow you to pass, Uzumaki." She hissed. "Lady Hokage may have deemed you harmless, but I know the truth. You are a spiteful, vindictive beast that needs to be put down. Your days will be numbered from the moment you pass through these gates, Uzumaki, and I will take great pleasure when the time comes to confirm that you are well and truly dead."

"Is that a threat?" Fu snarled, and Hinata stood up straight, looking at Fu as if she were a lesser being.

"Of course not. The intent to harm a citizen of your own village – civilian or Shinobi – is treason, plain and simple. I'm just stating that the village has changed in many ways, and anyone entering a Hidden Village are gambling their lives. We Shinobi are prone to having altercations with one another, and damage to the surrounding area is always a possibility." Hinata turned and started towards her post, only to find Fu's hand gripping her shoulder.

"Anything that is a threat to _my_ Naruto is a direct threat to me." She hissed, glaring . "And I remove all threats to me and mine."

Naruto quirked an eyebrow up at Fu's statement. _That_ was new.

_She must still need some practice..._

"Fu, hey, it's alright." Naruto gently reached over and pried Fu's hand (the fingernails sharpening into claw-like points did not escape his notice) from Hinata's shoulder. "This is gonna be hard enough without having to dodge attempts on my life." He waited until she was looking at him with softened eyes to continue. "And who said I needed you to stand up for me?"

" _Somebody_ had to, since you clearly weren't doing anything." She punched him in the shoulder, and with one last angry look at Hinata, the pair set off to join Tsunade in her meeting with the council of elders.

Hinata watched their retreating backs with narrowed eyes. She considered spreading word of Uzumaki's return, but decided against it. If the Godaime was going to make a statement to the entire village, then it most likely involved him and that woman that had been with him. Of course, since he came from outside the village, that meant that he had never been in the South Ward. Conversely, the fact that he was of his right mind, and had been for all that time, meant that any standing he might have had left with those few that supported him was baseless. He was now well and truly alone.

And she was going to enjoy every minute of it.

~~***~~

Within the Hokage's Office sat the three elders, in a manner similar to the meeting involving all of them over three years previously, with one key difference- where before they were waiting on Danzo, now it was Tsunade who had yet to arrive. The ANBU who had collected them and informed them of the meeting had given precious little as to why, though it didn't take much of a logical leap to figure out it involved the decision made by the Gokage during the Summit.

"-just hear me out! You don't have to accept, but-" Tsunade's loud voice, muffled into much quieter tones by the thick wooden door, announced her arrival- with a guest in tow. The door was opened just as the guest responded.

"And I'm not, so why are you even offering in the first place!" The voice was rather smooth, but held the barely-noticeable high pitch of someone in their mid-teens. The identity of the person was quickly known when Tsunade entered the room with two teens trailing behind – one disturbingly familiar, the other, much less so.

"Because, while Hitai-Ates do fall under ownership of the Village, this one is yours. I kept in from being refined into a fresh one and thought you would want it back." Tsunade was looking at Uzumaki Naruto with a pleadingly stern visage, who scoffed and pushed the proffered arm holding his Hitai-Ate away.

"No! Acceptance of a Hitai-Ate is an unwritten contract stating that you are allied with and are a Shinobi of the Hidden Village whose symbol is on the Hitai-Ate being offered." Naruto paraphrased the bylaw made at the first Gokage Summit concerning how a Shinobi's allegiance towards a Hidden Village – and, subsequently, their Kage – could be indicated. It was also where the ideal that a slash across the Hitai-Ate of a Shinobi showed that they had cut off any allegiance towards that village. "I'll ally with the joint army for the war, but not with Konoha.!"

"Fine!" Tsunade growled, pocketing the Hitai-Ate within her coat. "Let's just get this over with!"

"Yes, milady, but first things first." Danzo brought the attention of all present towards him. "How is Uzumaki Naruto alive?"

"Akatsuki didn't kill me, I've been doing my own thing since." Naruto waved the question off and sat down next to Danzo, gently pulling the teal-haired girl with him by her hand.

"So the banishment had finally been revoked." Homura stated, leaning back and tilting his head to get a better view of Naruto. He was no longer the happy-go-lucky child he had been back during the Chunin Exams- he exhibited almost none of the characteristics in the few short moments Homura had seen and heard the teen. The Uzumaki he knew would have jumped at the chance to reclaim his Hitai-Ate.

_Just what has he gone through since the enactment of the banishment..._

"So you have been in the Land of Iron all this time?" Danzo questioned, looking at Naruto and the girl sitting next to him dubiously.

"Nah. It was just where we were heading. Besides, have you _seen_ those Samurai?" Naruto brushed off, revealing almost nothing to the group.

"He was in the company of the other supposedly deceased Jinchuuriki." Tsunade elaborated. Gesturing to the girl, she continued. "This is Fu, the Nanabi Jinchuuriki."

"The Nanabi?" Danzo was suddenly looking at Fu with vested interest. "And what led to this?"

"More importantly, how can any of the Jinchuuriki be alive?" Koharu asked, gazing at the two teens searchingly.

"It seems that reports of Akatsuki being in possession of the Biju are... false." Glancing at the two teens who were leaning up against the back of the couch, looking at her intently, Tsunade matched their look. "And the situation involving Akatsuki is far more complex than we could ever wish it to be."

"One would be led to believe it to be the opposite." Danzo said, still staring at the teens from the corner of his sole remaining eye.

"Well, it's not." Tsunade replied, setting herself down next to the two elders. "They sent a squad to attack the Summit."

"A declaration of war to the entire ninja world?" Koharu queried. "That's pure suicide, even for the strongest of Shinobi."

"And this squad was pressing the advantage. All of them had the Rinnegan." The elders were shocked at that revelation.

"Not possible." Homura stated. "The Rinnegan is a myth."

"It is no myth, I assure you." Tsunade replied, her fingers curling into fists. "There were only six of them, under the moniker of Pein, and yet against the Kage _and_ our escorts, these six 'Pein' were pressing the advantage. Had the Jinchuuriki not been nearby the Elemental Nations would be without Kage."

"And what happened to these 'Pein'?" Danzo asked, his eye sweeping from the teens to Tsunade speculatively.

"Along with little Shizune. Cat mentioned her absence when retrieving us." Koharu added.

"Shizune..." Tsunade trailed off, and the elders knew without her saying another word.

"Our condolences." Koharu replied, her head bowed slightly in respect for the fallen.

"As terrible a loss as it is, we must deal with more pressing matters." Danzo moved the meeting back on topic. "What happened to this 'Pein'?"

"I... killed them all." Naruto quietly answered. "It figures, I guess. The first time I kill someone, it's Akatsuki."

"Kill or be killed." Fu supplied, and Danzo silently found himself agreeing with her – if only slightly.

"The girl is right." Danzo added. "Strike your enemies down before they have the chance to do the same to you."

"He was in the company of the other supposedly deceased Jinchuuriki." Tsunade elaborated. Gesturing to the girl, she continued. "This is Fu, the Nanabi Jinchuuriki."

"The Nanabi?" Danzo was suddenly looking at Fu with vested interest. "And what led to this?"

"More importantly, how can any of the Jinchuuriki be alive?" Koharu asked, gazing at the two teens searchingly.

"It seems that reports of Akatsuki being in possession of the Biju are... false." Glancing at the two teens who were leaning up against the back of the couch, looking at her intently, Tsunade matched their look. "And the situation involving Akatsuki is far more complex than we could ever wish it to be."

"One would be led to believe it to be the opposite." Danzo said, still staring at the teens from the corner of his sole remaining eye.

"Well, it's not." Tsunade replied, setting herself down next to the two elders. "They sent a squad to attack the Summit."

"A declaration of war to the entire ninja world?" Koharu queried. "That's pure suicide, even for the strongest of Shinobi."

"And this squad was pressing the advantage. All of them had the Rinnegan." The elders were shocked at that revelation.

"Not possible." Homura stated. "The Rinnegan is a myth."

"It is no myth, I assure you." Tsunade replied, her fingers curling into fists. "There were only six of them, under the moniker of Pein, and yet against the Kage _and_ our escorts, these six 'Pein' were pressing the advantage. Had the Jinchuuriki not been nearby the Elemental Nations would be without Kage."

"And what happened to these 'Pein'?" Danzo asked, his eye sweeping from the teens to Tsunade speculatively.

"Along with little Shizune. Cat mentioned her absence when retrieving us." Koharu added.

"Shizune..." Tsunade trailed off, and the elders knew without her saying another word.

"Our condolences." Koharu replied, her head bowed slightly in respect for the fallen.

"As terrible a loss as it is, we must deal with more pressing matters." Danzo moved the meeting back on topic. "What happened to this 'Pein'?"

"I... killed them all." Naruto quietly answered. "It figures, I guess. The first time I kill someone, it's Akatsuki."

"Kill or be killed." Fu supplied, and Danzo silently found himself agreeing with her – if only slightly.

"The girl is right." Danzo added. "Strike your enemies down before they have the chance to do the same to you."

"Have we heard from them? Is it known which member it was?" Tsunade questioned.

"We have. The member is currently unknown, but has an orange mask with a spiral shape centered around the right eye, which is the only opening the mask has. They tracked him into the Land of Sound, and lost him after attempting an ambush in what appeared to be one of Orochimaru's hideouts."

"They were ordered to engage?" Tsunade growled, leaning towards Danzo.

"No. They were under orders to stage an ambush, but not to directly engage, to ascertain the member's abilities." Danzo replied. "Any knowledge we can gain concerning the Akatsuki can be used in planning a tactical strike against them. Surely you agree?"

"...I do." Tsunade ground out, clearly not happy with the mission parameters. " So, we have the reconnaissance team recalled and all known information on Akatsuki compiled. The comm units, both stationary and mobile, must be prepped for movement, and all available medic-nins must be combat-ready inside of a week. Flak jackets will be distributed and mandatory wear for all Shinobi Chunin or higher. All Genin will be evaluated by their Jonin-Sensei for Chunin proficiency."

"Is that wise?" Koharu asked. "There are remarkably few Genin worthy of a promotion at the best of times."

"Yes, but have the Jonin-Sensei seek proficiency in combat and base tactics. We aren't looking for leaders, but skilled fighters capable of enough independent mindedness to survive on the battlefield." Tsunade answered without missing a beat."Are we in agreement?"

"Why must the comm units be readied for movement?" Danzo asked, staring at the Godaime curiously.

"Because as soon as the Daimyos agree, we will be a part of the Joint Shinobi Alliance, and the Fourth Great Shinobi World War will be declared."

"Joint Shinobi Alliance?" Koharu repeated.

"Yes. It was decided that the Raikage would act as leader, and we would convene at Kumo for the tactical advantage." Tsunade replied.

"The Raikage?" Danzo repeated dubiously. "Why convene at Kumo? And why were you not chosen, or the decision of leader delayed until the more experienced of us were informed?"

"A decision on leader was required to ensure there wasn't a bid for power later on. Raikage because he was the first to act when reports of the Jinchuurikis alleged capture by Akatsuki began. Kumo because the Land of Lightning has only two directions from which Akatsuki can attack from: the South and the Eastern Coast." Tsunade glanced at the two teens, who had kept quiet during the exchange. They were just staring at her expectantly – and with more than a little criticism and curiosity in Naruto's and Fu's respective eyes. "Now, are we in agreement?"

"Agreed." Homura said.

"Agreed." Koharu added.

"...agreed." Danzo finally conceded.

~~***~~

Jiraiya was barely winded when he reached the Fire Daimyo's palace, and took little notice when the protective squad of ANBU saluted him as he crossed the bridge to enter the palace. He slipped inside the building and moved towards the Daimyo's chambers.

"Oh, my." A voice from behind made him stop in his tracks. "Is that Jiraiya himself?"

Jiraiya turned around and saw the Fire Daimyo himself. Dressed in a dark kimono, the man was rather slender, his cheekbones highly prominent upon his face. Weaved into his topknot was a grass fan that had the symbol for the Land of Fire (a single flame) upon it.

"Greetings your lordship." Jiraiya went down on one knee, one fist holding his upper body as he bowed. "I come by request of the Hokage, who humbly seeks a meeting with you and your coffers."

"There is no need." The Daimyo snapped the paper fan he'd been waving in front of his face closed. "This meeting is in regards to this Joint Shinobi Alliance, is it not?"

"My lord, how-" Jiraiya made to stand up.

"Did I know?" The Daimyo let out a giggle and snapped his fan open. "Tell the Hokage that I have just returned from video conference with the other Daimyo, and the decision to form this Joint Shinobi Alliance and officialize this war of yours."

"Of course, my lord." Jiraiya bowed once more.

"You are Jiraiya of the Sannin. As gracious of you as it is, you do not need to bow in my presence." The Daimyo walked past where Jiraiya was crouched down upon the floor. "In fact, I've always favored you out of all the notable ninja Konohagakure has produced. There was a reason I placed your name into consideration for Godaime all those years ago."

Jiraiya stood up, and looked over in time to see the tail of the Fire Daimyo's kimono disappear within his chamber.

"...but I don't want to be Hokage." He whined to himself, before heading off back to Konoha to relay the news.

~~***~~

Tsunade stood overlooking the Shinobi of her village. Behind her, the elders stood like silent statues, ensuring that this was what must be done.

"For nearly two decades we have enjoyed peace across the Elemental Nations. There has been no war, but that does not mean that we have not suffered. Three years ago, a missing-nin, Orochimaru, launched a joint attack with Suna and his own village of Oto against us, and we lost the Sandaime. Nine years before that we entered into a peace treaty with Kumo, we were betrayed, and lost a skilled Shinobi as a result. Three years before that, the Kyuubi was set upon us, as we were recovering from the Third Great Shinobi World War.

"Now, seventeen years after the end of the Third War, I must inform you of the decision reached at the Gokage Summit." Tsunade took a breath. This was it. There was no turning back. "The Gokage were attacked and a declaration of war made by the criminal association known as Akatsuki. We have embarked upon the Joint Shinobi Alliance, consisting of all five of the Greater Hidden Villages, to be a part of the Fourth Great Shinobi World War."

Immediately after it was spoken, there was a massive uproar. Exclamations of shock and anger quelled up from the crowd.

"SILENCE!" Tsunade screamed, and was met with the majority quieting down. "The goal of Akatsuki is to acquire the Biju, though the exact reasoning behind this is unknown. It is presumed that they want to turn the Biju into weapons of their own to use against the Elemental Nations." She glanced back behind her, where Naruto and Fu were waiting behind the elders. "It was widely assumed that Akatsuki had seven of the Biju, only for this to turn out to be false. The Jinchuuriki had somehow escaped capture with the help of one of their own. This one Jinchuuriki has saved the Elemental Nations from destruction.

"Which leads me to revealing the identity of this Jinchuuriki. He and the other Jinchuuriki were what defeated the Akatsuki during the Gokage Summit." Tsunade was about to give Naruto more attention that he could ever want. "Everyone here may have heard of Uzumaki Naruto's loss of sanity and his lock-up in the South Ward of Konoha General. This... is not true. He was sent away from Konoha for the safety of all of you. During this transfer, he... vanished. The team that placed him at the drop-off reported back successfully, but his pick-up reported his absence. Coupled with rumors of Akatsuki in the area and it was widely assumed that he was captured and killed. However, this was false as well.

"Uzumaki Naruto is the Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi. The Third's Law has been rescinded." Tsunade finished, and the uproar was much more than the assembled Shinobi below.

"WHAT!" Naruto's voice came from behind, and Tsunade was thankful that she was professional enough not to flinch when his angry voice reached her. She just spun and walked away, allowing the elders to detail the specifics as she dealt with Naruto.

"It was necessary." She growled, stopping any argument he had in it's tracks. "Unless you can come up with a better idea for why I entered the village with you when you're supposed to be locked in the South Ward. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a village to prepare for war."

The week in Konoha had begun for Naruto, and it wasn't going to be easy on him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and so Naruto's week begins.


	30. Recoil

"How could she!" Naruto snarled, pacing around the same patch of carpet in one of the many hallways within the Hokage Manor. Fu stood to the side, and watched on with halfhearted interest, her arms folded across her chest. "That was never agreed upon. _How could she!_ "

"Naruto." Fu stood upright, moving away from the wall and halting his pacing by wrapping her arms around around him from behind. "You thought it better that these... people" The pause showing just how far she had come, and still had to go, was not lost to Naruto. "Believe you to be insane than understand just what you are?"

"It's not that I don't agree with what she did, just..." Naruto sighed, and Fu could _feel_ the tension in his body. "I was created to die for this village, and having the villagers and Shinobi openly discussing Kyuubi and their opinions of me to _my face_..."

"It's not right." Fu said, almost hollowly. They were originally said to her and Naruto and Gaara from Roshi (and the others, once the tightly wound man had nearly had an apoplectic fit after being locked in one of the Uzumaki houses with her for nearly a week, and decided that imparting knowledge of baser social niceties unto three socially negligent was too much of a hassle for just one man), and she had yet to find any deeper meaning hidden within. The teens had been told that their treatments were 'not right' and their upbringings were 'not right', but not once were they shown what wasn't 'not right'. To her, they had always been empty words, holding no meaning.

A small part of her felt that she would come to understand the meaning behind the words during her respite in Konoha.

"I _know_ it's not right, but..." He sighed again, and the tension was no closer towards dissipating. "That she made me out as some kinda savior..."

"That prophecy Yagura spoke of?" Fu asked, and Naruto shook his head.

"Namikaze's?" Naruto mused, recalling when he'd been told of Namikaze's delusions. "I think so. The Hokage would certainly know of it, seeing as her teammate was the one who spoke of it."

"Do... Are..." Fu paused, trying to figure out how best to phrase her next question. "You're tense. Has this talk... helped?"

It was more of a question about whether she was asking right than her actually asking, but it was progress. Before, she wouldn't have cared outside of the basic obligation of ensuring that those Shinobi that accompanied her on missions were able-bodied during and after combat.

"A little." Naruto replied. "The tension won't be going away until long after we leave, though. There's just too much baggage I've got here. Once we leave, I highly doubt there's any chance of me returning."

"Oh?" Fu's eyebrows scrunched together as they rose, indicative of her inquisitiveness.

"Yeah..." Naruto's face and eyes were looking at her, but his gaze was at something far off, that she couldn't even hope to see or comprehend. "I may not like having to leave behind my past here, but it's necessary if I want to start a life with you."

And that's what it kept coming down to. Naruto was safe from the curse of being a Child, but they both were still Jinchuuriki, so any children either of them had would be cursed. Together, it was unknown whether their children would be Children of both Kyuubi and Nanabi, if there would be _no_ connection, or if they could even _conceive_ (which was entirely too likely, as both Biju would fight over which connection would prevail and the fetus could miscarry every time). Despite Roshi's ideas otherwise, she and Naruto hadn't actually gone all the way (the furthest they had gone was in bed barely clothed), and the probability of miscarriage was not something Fu wanted to experience (pregnancy and childbirth came a close second).

"I also want to have our relationship to become more, and in order to do that, you need to find your own peace with the people of Konoha." Fu told him, paraphrasing the very thing that had been told to him just before their family had scattered to oversee the Gokage and their villages prepare for war. "I don't have any kind of history with Konohagakure, so the only thing I can do is ensure that your stay here is as least painful as I can feasibly accomplish."

"This is my battle to fight, not yours." Naruto agreed. "Just... promise me you'll be there, and won't you? And your view of me won't change because of them?"

The first I cannot promise, but state as a fact that I _will_ be there for you." Fu said, pulling him close. "The second... Nothing can change my view of you. I... am attracted to you, and nothing can change that."

Fu didn't love, _couldn't_ love, because love meant that she was exactly the same as those hu- those _things_ in Taki that neglected her, treated her like their pet.

She was _not_ the same as them, nor could she _ever_ be the same as them. If she was, if she accepted that ideal...

She couldn't. She wouldn't.

"I... thank you." Naruto smiled, and Fu could feel some of the tension in his body let up. The two of them gazed at each other, content in the comfort they could provide to each other, until a nearby door opened up.

"Hey, are you gonna get in here, I've got a war council to start." Tsunade said, breaking the moment. The teens broke apart, looking equal parts disgruntled and embarrassed at having been interrupted. The pair fixed Tsunade with the worst glares they could muster, but the older woman waved them off. "Yeah, yeah. Save the relationship stuff for later. Now get!"

However much they wanted to ignore Tsunade (and Fu was thinking up several ways in which the Hokage could be 'incapacitated' and leave her and Naruto be), they intertwined their fingers and walked side-by-side into the war room.

~~***~~

Shikamaru sat next to his father in the war room, feeling nervous – and more than a little bit guilty. The nervousness wasn't unfounded, having just learned that Konoha was on the brink of war. He was a born tactician – his entire family was, in a sense, as the Nara had always been the more mentally skilled of the Shinobi clans, even before the creation of the Hidden Villages. They had hidden in the Forest of Nara, working in tandem with the Akimichi and Yamanaka clans for what would be 16 generations once Shikamaru would take the place of his father as the leader of the Nara. That Konoha was about to enter into a war – one with so great an enemy that the Greater Hidden Villages were joining together to stop it (a completely unprecedented alliance on more than shaky ground due to the intrenched hatred and distrust of one another borne of the Great Shinobi World Wars) – and he was a part of the group that would gather and disseminate all known information on the enemy as well as decide what roles the Konoha Shinobi would fill out when creating the various divisions. A task that even his own father would find daunting.

The guilt, though, was anything but unfounded. He had harbored it ever since returning from his first mission both as Chunin and as mission commander. A mission that landed all of his subordinates in the hospital on the verge of death. A mission that had ended with one of his friends being confined in South Ward – or so he and the rest of Konoha had been led to believe.

Instead, Naruto had fled while being transported to a safe haven outside of Konoha where he could be properly looked after. While his actions after returning were horrendous, that Naruto had gone so far as to run away, an act that was completely uncharacteristic of the blond that he knew...

And what was more, that Naruto was something called a Jinchuuriki... Shikamaru wasn't quite sure just what a 'Jinchuuriki' was, but given that a person categorized as such is so closely involved with the Biju, and there was a law made regarding Naruto's status as one, which reminded him...

"What," Shikamaru asked his father, having to speak loudly over the clamor of the other members of the war council as they argued over every little detail, from what information to share with the other Greater Hidden Villages to what tactics and team formations to enact when the battles start to whether any countermeasures should be applied when working with any Shinobi from any of the other Hidden Villages. "is the Third's Law?"

His father turned away from his conversation with Inoichi (Ino's father and reinstated head of the Intelligence Division) over response times towards mid-battle tactical changes and looked at Shikamaru oddly.

"The Third's Law was created shortly after the Kyuubi's appearance within Konoha and its defeat." His father started. "It was done to prevent any of Konoha's enemies from finding out about the exact nature of the Yondaime's death and Kyuubi's defeat. However, there was more to it than that – the law was made to prevent knowledge of Naruto being the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki becoming public. None could speak of the Kyuubi under threat of treason and punishment of death by execution."

Shikamaru flinched. Shinobi lived in shadows, protecting village secrets, and the most honorable death a Shinobi could hope for was in battle, taking those secrets with them to the grave. Death by execution was the worst kind of death to give a Shinobi no matter the circumstances. Executions were highly public and every single part of them meant to shame the one being executed in the worst possible way. Shinobi were meant to die in battle protecting village secrets, to die via execution meant that those secrets were lost and any sort of pride they had towards their lives, which had been dedicated towards keeping those secrets secret, was forfeit.

"...And what is a Jinchuuriki?" Shikamaru asked, highly confused as to how all of this related to Naruto.

"A Jinchuuriki is someone whose life was forfeit to become a weapon for their village." Shikaku replied. "By having a Biju sealed within them."

"And Naruto has the Kyuubi." Shikamaru stated, comprehension setting in as Tsunade – with Naruto and a teenage girl in tow – walked into the room. His body jerked in surprise (he wasn't expecting to see Naruto this _soon_!), but the movement was hidden as the clamor died down and everyone moved to sit at attention.

The Godaime sat at the forefront of the three tables at the end of the room, the elders seated in the two desks situated behind and at either side of her's. Naruto and the girl glanced around the room, the girl with the amount of minor curiosity frequently found in experienced Chunin and Naruto with a mixture of disgust and apprehension (which made for an odd combination and made it look like Naruto was nauseous), before seating themselves at the end of the long table on the far right side of the room – the very table he and his father were sitting at. Shikamaru's gut clenched, and he began to wonder just how much Naruto had meant of what he'd said in that hospital room all those years ago.

Movement in the corner of his eye drew attention towards one of the elders, elder Koharu.

"All of you know why you were summoned." She began. "For those of you from before and those of you newly added, I bid you welcome to Konohagakure's war council."

Elder Koharu sat down, and in her stead the Godaime spoke up.

"Unlike the previous wars, we will not be acting alone against this threat. We will be united with the other four Greater Hidden Villages, standing as one to ensure not our own village, but the Shinobi lifestyle itself." The Godaime stated, and a hushed murmur flew through the council before an icy silence permeated the air. "For this reason, we will be creating and sending out a new reconnaissance team to replace the current one out in the field. All Jonin-Sensei will be ordered to test their Genin students for Chunin proficiency in battlefield combat and tactics only. Flak jackets and standard Chunin and Jonin uniforms will be mandatory."

"What of the comm units?" Inoichi asked. "Shall they be prepped for combat?"

"The comm units will be prepped for relocation." The Godaime answered. "We've entered into a Joint Shinobi Alliance, the headquarters of which are Kumogakure."

"Konoha's Shinobi population totals at over 20,000." Shikamaru's father spoke up. "How many of them are we sending out?"

"All of them." The reply was swift, and spurred an uproar.

"Milady, surely you don't intend of leaving the village helpless should Akatsuki plan to attack us directly?" A noble bearing the insignia for the barrier corps asked. Several others nodded assent, and looked at Tsunade in confusion and shock.

"Of course not." She scoffed. "A skeleton battalion consisting primarily of Genin led by select Chunin will protect the village in our absence. The elders, with their consent, will be overseeing village affairs during this time."

At their desks on either side of her, Koharu and Homura inclined their heads in agreement.

"Anyone that has a problem with that can easily find themselves serving amongst their colleagues on the front lines." Tsunade finished. When nobody spoke up, she continued. "Now, we will need to compile all knowledge we have on the organization known as Akatsuki, as well as its' individual members, both past and present."

"Ma'am." The head of the barrier corps spoke up. "Will we of the barrier corps find use in this war?"

"That's doubtful." Shikamaru's father, Shikaku, answered, and everyone looked to him for elaboration. "Konoha's barrier corps operates on a massive barrier seal created by the Shodai's wife when Konoha was first founded. That seal is rumored to have taken weeks to create, and several days to implement. Time we do not have against an enemy we know almost nothing about."

"He's right." The head of the cryptanalysis squad, a tweedy-looking man in a lab coat, added. "Against this Akatsuki, neither the barrier nor the cipher corps will be able to participate in this war."

"Nor will anyone proficient in Torture and Interrogation jutsu." Inoichi added. "Akatsuki may just be a small terrorist cell, but their might is undoubtedly too much to risk live capture of any of their members. The best we can hope for is ensnaring their dead bodies to autopsy."

"That's assuming that their native village will allow it." The head of the ANBU stated, his/her mask hiding away their identity. "Those bodies will contain village secrets the Kages themselves would kill to obtain. If anyone other than medic-nins from Konoha were to get their hands on the corpse of Uchiha Itachi..." S/he trailed off, and all present knew what the ANBU leader was talking about.

"But we can't afford not to autopsy the bodies." Shikamaru spoke up. "There's no telling whether or not more than one member has the same abilities."

"That's right." Tsunade added. "The members that attacked the Gokage Summit all had the same Kekkei Genkai, however differently they were each using it. This matter will be discussed at length once all knowledge of Akatsuki from each of the Greater Hidden Villages is compiled together among the Kage."

"This is a landmine." Shikamaru realized. "Not just this war, but the logistics behind it. We're going about this the wrong way."

"Of course it is. This alliance is bringing together Hidden Villages with nearly a century of animosity towards each other. It's impossible for any one of them to not be planning something against one another." The Godaime said. "However, whether or not we do need to plan against them, the fact remains that Akatsuki is too dangerous to ignore over petty squabbles. As of this moment, we are not Konohagakure, plotting against the other villages. We are a part of the Joint Shinobi Alliance, a massive army intent upon taking down the strongest missing-nin to ever appear in the Elemental Nations: Uchiha Madara."

"One of the founders?" The cryptanalysis squad head asked, confusing marring his visage. "But, he died at the Valley of the End. Even if he survived, he would have passed away decades ago."

"Details on how Madara's still alive are, at best, sketchy." The Godaime replied.

"Yagura doesn't like talking about it." Naruto huffed, crossing his arms in exasperation. The girl next to him just kept sitting at attention, though she looked extremely bored. Shikamaru narrowed his eyes at their behavior – Naruto hadn't spoken up until now when he would normally have been the most vocal, speaking his mind about anything and everything. The girl, however, was an unknown – she carried herself like a seasoned Shinobi yet bore none of the respect or determination required of one.

"'Sides," Naruto continued. "I can't let you make any plans against any of the other Hidden Villages. That's the point of me being here."

"And how do you know that we won't just make these plans behind your back?" Hyuga Hiashi, sitting at the table directly across from Shikamaru, asked.

"I don't." Naruto replied slowly. "Which is why the simple threat of what I'll do if Konoha uses this war to cripple any of the other Hidden Villages will keep you from making them."

At that calm statement a tumultuous uproar erupted from the council. Cries of "you can't" and "you wouldn't" flew from the assorted Jonin towards the teen, who looked at them all with crudely hidden contempt.

"Quiet!" Tsunade barked, and the roar quieted down, until everyone was either glaring at Naruto or looking at him in distaste. She fixed Naruto with a hard look, who responded with repressed anger. "Explain. Now."

"Our presence at each of the villages is only to ensure fair play between those in this alliance." The girl answered, snapping out of her bored stupor to fix Tsunade with a determined look. "The exact details of just what we are to do to prevent those measures was left unknown, as our standing orders are to 'use any means within our powers'. What Naruto proposes is well within our rights."

"Then it is a threat." Elder Koharu stated. "Abd will be dealt with as such."

"Can you afford it?" The girl replied. "Konoha is about to embark upon an alliance with the other Greater Hidden Villages. The loss of manpower in taking down the two of us is hardly worth the effort. Not to mention how our kin will obviously react to your actions."

The glares shifted from Naruto, whose fingernails were carving grooves in the table as they clenched and he shook with repressed emotion, to the girl, who was looking at them all disinterestedly, like everyone was a lesser being. Shikamaru felt a stab of guilt at seeing Naruto in that state before it was replaced with wariness and not a small amount of anger at what the girl (who had revealed herself as one of the Jinchuuriki) was saying.

"Neither Konohagakure, the Land of Fire nor the Joint Shinobi Alliance will be able to withstand such a great loss." The girl continued, her eyes sweeping across everyone until they rested upon the Hokage. "For all your sakes, pray you do not incur my wrath. Especially not by forcing my hand."

A hand laid upon her shoulder, bringing her attention towards Naruto, who was looking at her with respect, admiration, and something Shikamaru suspected was love. That last one caught him off guard – he hadn't thought Naruto capable of such a deep, complex emotion. None of his old classmates (the ones that he was still in contact with, at least) were focusing on any relationships, only concerned about their missions and training. The average Shinobi didn't start looking to settle down and start a family until at least twenty years of age, yet Naruto, at seventeen, looked like he wanted to be a husband and father. And he had found that he wanted to marry in this girl, who was apparently a Jinchuuriki the same as Naruto.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Shikamaru's inquisitive nature wouldn't let him rest until he learned more about both Naruto as he was now, and this girl. Whoever she was, she had to be something spectacular for Naruto to have fallen (probably, Shikamaru's mind rationalized) in love with her.

"Fine." The Godaime spoke through gritted teeth, looking highly displeased with the turn of events. "We will prepare for war against Akatsuki, nothing more. Satisfied?"

The girl was silent, sweeping her eyes across the room, stopping briefly at Elder Danzo, and acknowledging the unanimous enmity directed towards her and the blond.

"I am." She finally replied, indifferent to the enmity. "Ensure your Shinobi uphold this ideal, and Konoha will receive no problems from either of us."

~~***~~

Naruto sped out of the room as fast as he could, ignoring the cry of his name from Shikamaru (he just _knew_ the cry came from the Nara, and damn it all if he wasn't able to avoid any of his former friends during his stay) in favor of just... being somewhere, anywhere that wasn't where he had to confront that part of his past. A quick glance over his shoulder proved that Fu had most likely stayed behind – hopefully to discuss living conditions (he was _not_ returning to his old apartment, where everyone would think to look for him first). He continued his brisk sprint out of and away from the Hokage Tower, and was almost immediately besieged from all sides by Konoha Shinobi.

Where there was once whispers and subversive attempts to avoid making contact with him was now overt stares, open conversations, and an almost perverse lack of privacy towards his life that made Naruto sick to his stomach.

"There he is!" A preteen boy (most likely a Genin, given his tiny stature) pointed directly at Naruto.

" _That's_ him?" An older girl this time, condescending.

"The deserter?"

"The Kyuubi Jinchuuriki? Really?"

"Why did he desert?"

Naruto hastened his pace, wrapping his arms around himself as he tried not to start running. The voices, meanwhile, were getting more curious and he was starting to garner a following – while keeping a safe distance from him, as the crowd was parting and giving him a wide swath as he moved down the street.

"Why is he dressed like a civilian, or fresh Genin?"

"Where's his Hitai-Ate?"

"Why did he run?"

"Where did he go?"

"Why leave?"

For lack of a response from the person in question, the crowd decided to share what information they had on rumors concerning the week before his banishment.

"I heard he was violent."

"He attacked anyone he could, I heard."

"Didn't Lady Godaime say he went insane?"

"Insane? He was downright feral. Attacked some of the doctors at the hospital."

In his mind, Naruto was chanting that it was only a week; he just had to survive a week, and then he wouldn't have to return ever again.

"You think it was because of the Kyuubi?"

"Maybe he really was as bad as everyone made him out to be."

"Did Lady Hokage say if he was sane?"

"He's a Jinchuuriki. Should we be afraid of retaliation?"

One week. Seven days. A hundred sixty-eight hours. He could do this.

"A Jinchuuriki? What's that?"

"A person with a demon sealed in them. Crazy strong because of the demon's power."

"Doesn't that make them the demon then?"

Not even a week – it had started the moment they had crossed the barrier. More like a little over six days. He could do this.

"You really think he's the Kyuubi?"

"Him, the Kyuubi? Don't make me laugh."

He just had to ignore them. He could do this.

"It would explain quite a bit. Didn't you say that he used Kyuubi's chakra against that one Hyuga in that one Chunin Exam? Y'know, the one that wasn't finished?"

"Does that really make him the demon, though?"

"He still went insane, though. Was that because of the Kyuubi?"

"The Kyuubi? You think so?"

"It has to be the Kyuubi. What else could there be?"

"If it's the Kyuubi, then how do we know that it isn't the Kyuubi right now."

"Idiot! We'd be long dead if he was the Kyuubi!"

And when would they stop talking about Kyuubi? Every other word out of their mouths was Kyuubi! Kyuubi, Kyuubi, Kyuubi, Kyuubi-

"Naruto?"

He turned around at the mention of his name, coming face-to-face with-

His heart skipped a beat.

Iruka-Sensei.

Naruto's eyes widened. Iruka-Sensei had been there when he had said all that to Hinata. Had been there when he had been at his worst. Had stood by as Naruto mocked Hinata in the worst way he could have. This was the man who had been the first – the _very first_ – person to ever see him as he had been, and Naruto wasn't sure if Iruka-Sensei would even understand his frigid stance towards Konoha, let alone his decision to refuse reinstatement as a-

Crap.

His Hitai-Ate, _Iruka-Sensei's_ Hitai-Ate, originally, that was proof of the man's faith in Naruto's abilities and faith in Naruto himself. He couldn't refuse it, since it was a physical representation of everything Iruka-Sensei had entrusted in him, yet he had to, as acceptance would mean that he was forever doomed to be a weapon of Konoha.

In that vein of thought, though, was the realization that Naruto was no longer that naïve child with aspirations of becoming Hokage. Would never again be the person proclaiming his dream of being Hokage to anyone that would listen. He was almost a completely different person now. He couldn't face Iruka-Sensei.

He couldn't face anyone. It was why he had fled from the war council meeting. He couldn't bring himself to face Shikamaru.

Naruto was a coward in that regard. A coward, because he didn't – _couldn't_ – face his past.

So he fled back to the Hokage Tower, where he would find Fu, and some semblance of comfort and solace during this week-long stay in hell.


	31. Cowardice

"You ran." Yet another statement.

"Yeah." More pacing, this time a little more frantic.

"Was it the wisest course of action?" The question was asked with a greater amount of certainty than her earlier one, and Naruto was glad about that.

"If you were in my shoes, yes." The reply was swift, and a tad more biting that it probably should have been, but Naruto barely cared about that. "If you'd heard half of what the villagers were saying you'd..."

Naruto trailed off, realizing just who he was talking to, and the life she had led before going with him.

"I would what?"

Naruto was never more happy than that moment for Fu having no clue of what he'd almost inadvertently said. Not so coincidentally, he was also never more ashamed of himself for feeling happy at the inability of another person to understand the connotations of his half of the conversation (which had rarely happened with Fu; usually it was Gaara that didn't understand Naruto's insinuations).

"Nothing." Naruto found it best to move past the snag in the conversation. "And it may not have been the _wisest_ thing to do, it sure was the _best_ thing to do."

"Why was that?" Fu tilted her head forward, an odd habit that she always did whenever she was curious about something. "Was it not better to face your past? Wasn't that what we had agreed to hours ago, that you would find your peace with Konoha?"

"I..." Naruto quailed under the reminder of their promise. "I can't. Not yet."

"If not now, then when?" Fu looked curious, wanting the answer. "You have made it very clear just how we will not return when we join the Konoha-nin in their trek to the Alliance in the Land of Lightning; and the faster we can expunge yourself from the ties that bind you here, the more we can expedite starting a family."

Fu's words cut close, reminding Naruto of all that was at stake. Konoha was a dark shadow in his heart that prevented him from becoming the person he wanted to be; becoming the person he wanted any children he had with Fu (adopted, of course; the inevitability of their child being a Child meant that they couldn't have blood children) to look up to with respect, with admiration.

With the love of a child to their father.

"You're right." Naruto finally said, sitting down next to Fu on their shared bed within the Hokage Tower, causing the mattress to dip down towards the floor. "I... need to stop running. It's time I face my past, the good and the bad."

Their hands intertwined, curling around each other for comfort only found in one another. They leaned in close, their individual movements slightly jerky and stiff from the alien nature. Neither Naruto nor Fu were intimately acquainted with the intricacies of personal contact between two people, and it showed. Arms bumped against one another. A chin scraped against a shoulder. Two bodies pulled too close in a too-tight embrace. Legs shifted, pushing and prodding each other as they fought to align into comfortable positions.

They finally settled down on their backs, Naruto's hands wrapped around Fu and pulling her into his chest from behind.

"Could we... Would you..." Fu struggled to find the right words. "Konoha is the strongest of the Hidden Villages, both economically and in Shinobi population. Would it be too much to have you show me the many different facets of the village over the next few days? When we aren't attending the war council meetings, of course."

"Sure. I can take you to see the sights." Naruto paused as the words sank in. "...Is... Are you... asking me on a date?"

"It can be construed as a date." Fu shifted her eyes to the left, away from Naruto. "It is perfectly fine if you do not feel the need to. I am sure I can-"

"Fu." Naruto cut in. "We are going on a date. An honest, official, 'both people consent' date."

"Then... what's that term people use?" Fu asked, turning to look at Naruto, almost bumping her head into his own in the process.

Naruto smiled.

"It's a date."

~~***~~

The whispers-that-weren't were quieter that day, the populace having had the past day to let the news about Naruto's return, along with the rescinding of the Sandaime's Law, sink in.

Now that it had, though, everyone was opting to stare, with several dozen badly attempting to hide it. The whispering itself had changed focus; with everyone now knowing what a Jinchuuriki was, along with _who_ Konoha's was.

 _Had been_ , really. Naruto was still a Jinchuuriki; just not Konoha's.

He was his own man now, with his own life, no longer needing to get stronger to protect his loved ones or to prove himself in the eyes of Konoha. If he needed more strength, it was because his family needed him to fight alongside them, not because there were others, weaker than Naruto, that needed _him_ to protect _them_.

And he _would_ fight alongside them. Their enemies- Akatsuki, Madara, they were too strong to take on alone. And they weren't alone; not anymore.

"So, there's not much here that's very notable." Naruto started, gesturing around him while Fu watched on. "Anything important that counts as sightseeing are either the library, which is atop the mountain, the mountain itself, and the Hokage Tower. There are a couple other places, like the Daimyo's palace and the fire temple, but those don't really count and I've never been."

"What part of Konoha did you grow up in?" Fu asked, looking at Naruto curiously.

"East end, near the wall." Naruto replied, looking relieved at the question. "You wanna see it?"

"I would not have asked if I didn't want to be taken there." Fu replied, amused at Naruto's reply.

Together, they set off, taking the many streets, side streets, and back alleys (occasionally having to backtrack, as Naruto's personal route to his old neighborhood was better utilized by bodies much smaller than their own) until they were forced to take to the rooftops, leaping from rooftop to ledge and back until the duo stood at the foot of a thin, angular apartment complex.

"Here it is." Naruto gestured from his crouching position atop a nearby ledge, looking much like a cat with his hands up between his feet. Fu, on the other hand, was nimbly balanced atop an electrical pole by one foot, the flat of her other foot pressing against her right inner thigh.

"Interesting." Fu demurely stated, rubbing her right index finger against her upper lip in thought. In truth, it was more than interesting.

It was appalling.

When Fu was still dependent upon Takigakure, her place of residence had been little more than a rotted out piece of tree root on the northern edge of the village. It had been the very place that all of Taki's 'pets' had lived within since the first Nanabi Jinchuuriki had been borne.

The... hovel (which was giving it much too much credit) was literally a rotting piece of wood. It had consisted of a single hollowed out part of the root, filled with moss and fungus that acted as insulation from the cold and bed for her to rest upon. Her clothes were given to her merely as a formality, to give their 'pet' the hope of being treated as an equal, along with the ability to put on a fancy show of being held in high regard when dealing with anyone from outside the village.

That Naruto had been given a place, an actual, real apartment of his own, as well as a proper education and actually being treated like he was of the same species-

But he was, and she was, and they were both the same species – human. The same as the rest of the world.

And she hated it.

Fu jumped down from her spot, spinning in the air before nimbly landing on her feet, a contradiction to Naruto, who had landed in a crouch (their mannerisms in that regard being similar in nature to their Biju). Glancing around at the neighborhood, with its cramped streets, web of electrical wiring dangling above their heads, Fu hummed.

"It is... interesting." She repeated, and ignored Naruto's sidelong glance at her reiteration. "Have you always lived here?"

"Not always." Naruto dubiously replied. "Until I joined the academy, I lived under the guardianship of a civilian family."

"A civilian family?" Fu queried. "Why civilians? Wouldn't it have been more prudent to have been the ward of a Shinobi clan?"

"It's common practice for orphans, particularly war orphans, to live with civilian families." Naruto answered. "I remember being told early on that it was so that they had the choice of either being recruited into the Shinobi ranks or remaining in the civilian world. Orphans of the old Shinobi clans were taken in by clan members, though."

"Given your less-than-satisfactory education, I was not aware that you were knowledgeable of those kinds of things." Fu stated, her brow rising inquisitively.

"I _do_ pay attention." Naruto retorted, offended. "What do you take me for, an idiot?"

Fu stared at Naruto, deadpan.

"I'm not!"

"If you say so."

"...it's times like these that make me wonder what I see in you." Naruto sulked.

"Physical attraction and appreciation of my self." Fu responded. "Now, are there any places that you frequented as a child? Perhaps even when you were a Konoha-nin?"

The question eased the tension, for Naruto started explaining to her the parks he used to go to, and the many times he had traveled through the forest, either to train or while looking for a secret place, a home away from home, to hide at and bring any friends he might have made (which had never happened; any children that had shown an interest in being his friend or playing with him had been whisked away by their parents and never seen again).

"Perhaps," Fu interrupted the nervous babble. "We should start with actual places. Konoha's ninja academy and Konoha General Hospital, would be excellent starting points."

"The hospital." Naruto quickly replied. "Let's start there."

Fu did not remark that his reply had been a bit _too_ quick, and left it at that.

~~***~~

Konoha General Hospital was one of the three largest buildings in Konoha – the other two being the Academy and Hokage Manor. The reasons for this were quite simple: Genin graduates numbered in the dozens every six months (the graduation exam was held shortly before the Chunin Exams were slated to occur, to balance out the Chunin promotions with fresh Genin, not to mention that it was where nearly all of Konohagakure's administrative duties occurred, making the Academy the single largest structure in all of Konoha), and Hokage Manor was where the Hokage resided (and provided more than enough room for either the current Hokage's clan or family to reside, not to mention it was the most secure location for war council to be held).

Konoha General Hospital was for a far more obvious reason: with Konoha-nin numbering in nearly twenty thousand, the medical corps was expected to be massive to sustain injuries from war, or viral epidemics (which rarely occurred after medical jutsu had been created).

"This is the hospital." Naruto stated rather lamely, given the large sign at the main entrance stating it as such. "We can go in and ask around for any info you want to know."

"That would be excellent." Fu replied. "I am curious about the many different medical subdivisions Konoha likely has."

"Right." Naruto dubiously replied. "Why do you want to know all that?"

"Because information is useful." Fu diplomatically answered. "We do not yet know our capacity in this war, so having knowledge of who is and is not capable of healing us in case of injury."

"That's... amazingly selfless." Naruto confessed.

"I would define my actions more as prudent than selfless." Fu responded flippantly, walking towards the building. "Injury equals death on the battlefield. My interest is merely to prevent such an occurrence."

Naruto shook his head and sighed, a smile on his face as he followed Fu into the hospital. Once inside, they walked towards the desk, failing to attempt to cross the flurry of Shinobi and med-nins without difficulty. Naruto was too well-known after the Hokage's announcement for them to travel anywhere within Konohagakure without recognition. Twitching at the failed attempt to give the two a wide berth (as there were only so many places the Shinobi could go without chakra expenditure, which wasn't suggested the day of any medical check-up).

"You know, I'd say we should come back later, but-" Naruto started.

"It can only get worse as the week goes on." Fu finished, confident as she strode towards the front desk. "The Joint Alliance needs every capable soldier, and as such, all Shinobi are required to get labeled fit for duty in the event of war."

"Yeah." Naruto replied grimly. "That."

As they approached the desk, Naruto and Fu were subject to the view of a trio of Genin (a squad, if the way they argued & defended each other was any indication) angrily yelling at their Jonin-Sensei.

"-not fair!" The dark-haired one grumbled. "What's the point in being ninja if we can't fight to protect Boss!"

Naruto started, a full-body twitch that had him misstep into the receptionist's desk painfully. Bending over, his arms wrapped around his midsection, Naruto was brought face-to-face with the kid he had once thought of as a younger brother-figure. Konohamaru brought his head around from glaring at his Sensei ( _Is that the closet pervert?_ , Naruto dimly thought) to find himself mere inches from the person he had just been speaking about.

Mentor and student stood staring at each other, both too shocked at the presence of the other to do anything else. Konohamaru's team shifted uncomfortably at the sudden appearance of their friend's 'boss', with their Sensei looking extremely uncomfortable. Fu, meanwhile, was content to leave Naruto be; it was clear that the two knew each other from the Genin's reaction, and what she wanted to know about the medic-nin of Konoha could easily be garnered at the front desk (because even if the Genin didn't know Naruto, there was still a chance that he would need her there for support).

"Come, come." Ebisu gently pushed Konohamaru's teammates into the throng. "We mustn't keep the doctors from their patients any longer than necessary."

He reached out for Konohamaru, intending on pulling him along by the scruff of the scarf the boy wore, only for the Genin to shrug out of the grip and press forward into Naruto.

"Boss!" He cried, awkwardly wrapping his arms around Naruto's bent torso as tears started pooling in his eyes, which were then buried into the blond's shoulder.

Naruto, though, had yet to move, still in the same bent-double position from a moment before. His eyes gazed ahead blankly, before shifting to the sobbing form to his left.

Konohamaru... wasn't afraid of Naruto; didn't hate him. Hell, he might've even... missed him.

The concept, that even a single one of those he had befriended in Konohagakure had still cared for him after what he had been like, and for so long, even in the face of all things contrary...

It didn't seem possible. All of those he had considered his 'friends' had been alienated before he was banished, and anyone that he hadn't most likely would have succumbed to the false reports of his sanity or the word of those that had been present.

So Konohamaru's muffled cries of how much he had missed Naruto, of how dull Konoha had been without him, and how great it was that he wasn't ill anymore... They couldn't be sincere.

"But," Here Konohamaru hesitated, his grip on Naruto slackening. "Why did you run? Lady Godaime said..."

And there it was.

He hadn't missed Naruto, not really. What he had missed was _Naruto_ , the naïve, happy-go-lucky boy that believed that all it took was good, hard work to become Hokage.

 _Naruto_ , who had taught the boy his prank Transformation, Shadow Clone (though that one was much harder, as while it didn't require too much chakra to create, the fact that all of the user's chakra was equally divided amongst the clones and original made it hard for Konohamaru to use whenever he wanted), and even Rasengan. Who had inspired the boy into declaring a rivalry for the title of Hokage.

He didn't miss Naruto, Child of Kyuubi and its' Jinchuuriki, offspring of Uzumaki Kushina and the Yondaime Hokage.

"She's wrong." Naruto said, pulling away from the slack grip.

"What?" Konohamaru replied, confused. "No, she's not. You- you were scared, and ran for safety. That's what happened. You escaped, and hid, and fought off _the_ Kyuubi to get back to normal."

Naruto was taken aback. Konohamaru... he thought that Kyuubi was the cause of what had been wrong with him (which was partly true; as both Jinchuuriki and Child, Kyuubi was mostly responsible for the situation, while the rest of the blame lay solely on Naruto). He knew about Kyuubi, and was concerned about his 'boss', his 'big brother-figure'.

Except that the Naruto before him was neither of those things. He wanted to be, but he wasn't; couldn't.

To be that person again, after working so hard with his fellow Jinchuuriki to become a new person... He couldn't. It was too painful to think, let alone do – that he would ultimately become the very thing his father (and he used that term _very_ loosely, no matter what anyone said otherwise) wanted of him were he to continue as a Shinobi of Konoha. Sure, he'd live longer due to the replacement of the Dead Demon Consuming Seal, but it didn't change his ultimate fate: to only be kept alive until his usefulness ran out, when they (the elders and Hokage) trick him into killing himself to remove Kyuubi and place it in a new, pliable Jinchuuriki, one that would remain loyal to the Hokage and perform every mission given to him or her with the utmost of of skill s/he had.

Naruto would not let that happen. _Could not_ let that happen.

"Is – that's what you think?" Naruto asked, twisting his face into a tense facsimile of a smile, which came out more like a disgusted grimace. "Because that isn't entirely true."

"Not true?" Konohamaru looked confused and unsettled by Naruto's reaction. "Then, what is the, um, truth?"

The Genin sounded uncertain of himself, like he was just realizing how... off-putting Naruto was being. Naruto hated having to do this (out of everyone he knew, the kid was one of few that Naruto was sure wouldn't treat him like an outcast), but if he didn't, then Konohamaru would continue believing that Naruto's views towards Konoha and being a Konoha-nin could be swayed.

"Konohamaru," Naruto began. "I didn't abandon Konoha."

"I _know_!" He interrupted, and was silenced by a raised hand from the blond.

"Let me finish." Konohamaru looked abashed, and waited for him to continue. "I didn't abandon Konoha; _Konoha_ abandoned _me_."

"Wh-what?" It hurt, having Konohamaru look at him like Naruto had just betrayed everything he had ever stood for. He shouldn't have been put into this corner; Tsunade shouldn't have foisted this off on him. The hell of explaining the truth of the matter to everyone who had once trusted him. Tsunade had driven him into a corner when she had made him out to be a hero, and it had been an ultimatum: accept the status and acceptance from the village as their 'savior', or become the outcast by spreading the truth.

Damned if he did, damned if he didn't. An impossible choice, had he wanted to remain in Konoha.

"It's true." Naruto added, keeping his face as impassive as possible as Konohamaru's became incredulous. He could feel the pressing eyes of the other Shinobi in the room on him as he stood up straight, and felt another hand snake around his and give a reassuring squeeze.

It was calming, knowing that Fu was there for support. She may not be able to fully understand what he was feeling, but that she was _there for him_... was comforting.

"It can't be!" Konohamaru cried, his mouth agape in horrific shock. "Lady Godaime-"

"Lied." Naruto interrupted. "She made the decision to remove me from the ranks and release me far from anyone."

"It was to keep you safe!" Konohamaru reasoned. "The Kyuubi, it- it affected you! It was dangerous and had to be stopped!"

"If it could have been stopped, then I never would have been banished." Naruto countered. "She explained it all to me – no matter what she tried, there wasn't a cure to be found."

By now the entire room had quelled down, and even the doctors (both Shinobi and civilian) had stopped looking at patients and were listening intently. Naruto _knew_ this wouldn't help him if ( _when_ , he replaced, as various members of the group, himself included, had expressed a desire to eventually travel through each of the Hidden Villages; with Konoha being one of the foremost Hidden Villages, there was little doubt that he could keep his family from going there without him) he returned, but he would rather be an outcast because of the truth than a hero borne of a lie.

"Then..." Konohamaru trailed off, hesitant to finish his thought.

"You weren't all that far off when you said that..." Naruto paused, his next words both damning and, he knew, not the first nor the last he would have to say them. "Kyuubi was responsible for what happened to me."

"I knew it!" The Genin breathed, before his face contorted into a rictus of confusion. "But then..."

"There exists a special sort of person, even more rare than those with Kekkei Genkai." This was the part that Naruto absolutely _hated_ – the revelation that his mother was a Jinchuuriki, and he her Child. He didn't know about her standing in Konoha, aside from what Roshi said he knew of her, or even if anyone knew that she had been a Jinchuuriki, but it _hurt_ him, in a part of his heart that he hadn't known existed, to have to do this. "They themselves have certain special Kekkei Genkai, and are the first to have it."

While the silence that had pervaded the air before had been one of rapt attention, now it was a harsher, more dead silence. Nobody spoke, and it both seemed and felt like nobody breathed.

"The first with... Kekkei Genkai?" It was unknown who had spoken (it may have been a doctor, given the amount of shock in the voice at the idea of a new Kekkei Genkai, as documentation on the evolution of any Kekkei Genkai is practically nonexistent), but it spurred Naruto onwards.

"I don't know if this is what happens every time a Kekkei Genkai is created, but it has a specific requirement of one of the parents." Naruto continued, and could practically see the thought process of everyone in earshot, that Naruto was an even greater hero for bearing the first of a new Kekkei Genkai. "This requirement is why it's never done, and why it's even become a universally banned practice in the other Hidden Villages by their Kage."

"Banned?" The strangled squeak unmistakably came from Konohamaru, who was making certain inferences (Kyuubi partly responsible, first bearer of Kekkei Genkai).

"Yes." Naruto swallowed, trying to wet his suddenly dry throat. "It is the practice of a Jinchuuriki becoming a parent."


	32. Provocation

"Let her go."

A red-haired man, pale and emaciated, glared at glared at the masked man before him. Within the masked man's grip, a blue-haired woman was held with her head lodged in the crook of the assailant's elbow, his hands on either side of her head. All around them, countless pieces of paper were strewn every which way, with many lodged within the ground and the surrounding trees.

"While I find your attempts to leave me amusing, keep in mind who those eyes truly belong to." The masked man, Madara, intoned, tightening and twisting his grip on Konan's head. Konan groaned at the pain but it seemed to spur her into action. Her hands blurred through seals as her breathing became heavier. All around them, the sheets of paper flew into the air, rapidly spinning as they converged on her and her captive.

Nagato's eyes widened, and with a grunt, he pulled his arms out of the apparatuses on his mechanical walker. His arms, like the rest of him, were pale gray bordering on white, and there were thick ebony cylinders that jutted out of his arms, angled outwards towards his hands. His eyes flicked over Konan's captive form, and their eyes met. Any hesitation that had existed before was gone now; all that was left was resigned acceptance.

Nagato clapped his hands together. Between his palms, a black ball appeared, looking similar to the ebony rods in his arms and jutting out of his back. Madara tightened his grip on Konan's head, threatening to snap her neck.

"I never forget, Madara." Nagato spat, and launched the black ball high into the air. "They belong to Amegakure, the one that Yahiko helped build."

There was a small hum, so small that it was dismissed as background noise, as massive chunks of ground were pulled into the air, towards the black ball.

"They belong to _me_!" Madara yelled, and gave a jerk of his arms. There was a cracking noise, indistinguishable in the midst of the cracking and crunching and rumbling of the chunks of rock pushing against itself to create a compact sphere of rock in the air, and Konan's struggles ceased. Her limp body slipped through his arms and crumbled down on the ground, which cracked and rose into the air.

Madara moved swiftly across the tumultuous land towards Nagato, who pointed his right hand directly at the approaching man while his left was directed towards Konan's body.

"Shinra Tensei!"

Madara flew backwards, his immaterial body affected by the power of the Rinnegan. His form flew into and through a boulder, whereupon he vanished from Nagato's sight.

"Bansho Tenin!"

Konan's body flew towards Nagato, and was soon cradled in his arms as the ground beneath him rose towards the misshapen sphere.

"I'm sorry." He whispered to her, brushing a strand of hair out of her face. "We never did make it back home."

Home, for the three of them (Yahiko, Konan and Nagato), was the small ramshackle cabin they had lived in when their Sensei had been teaching them, and later had served as the original base of operations for Akatsuki. The pure, real Akatsuki that Yahiko had founded as the symbol that peace and change was coming. When it had been partly destroyed and they had had to abandon it several years ago, the three of them had vowed to return when their dream was realized.

They had never returned. Not when they had become powerful enough to be recognized (and they'd thought, respected) by Hanzo. Not when Yahiko had died. Not when Akatsuki had fallen apart, or when Nagato and Konan had been approached by Madara to reshape Akatsuki into a force of power.

And now, with Yahiko gone both in body and spirit, and Konan having passed as well, Nagato knew that they were doomed never to have returned.

He was disrupted from his thoughts as Madara reappeared in his peripheral vision, and several strands of hair fell across his face as he leveled his most intense glare. Madara jumped from rock to rock, moving ever closer.

"You will never take these eyes. They are the pride of Amegakure." Nagato snarled. "Shinra Tensei!"

Madara flew back into and through several boulders, and was now in free-fall towards the ground, Nagato saw. Above him, a shadow came into view, as the satellite he had created using Chibaku Tensei – Catastrophic Planetary Construction – grew ever larger, and the chunk of ground his mechanical walker was attached to approached the surface.

"It looks like we've reached the end of our journey." Nagato noted fondly, cradling Konan's form closer. "I only regret never having achieved your dream, Yahiko."

And somewhere in the back of his mind, Nagato heard a whisper from a voice he hadn't heard in many years, and he strained to listen to it. They were the last words he heard before the rock he was on crashed into the satellite and was buried beneath even more rocks.

 _I already achieved it, Nagato._ The voice had whispered. _You brought peace to Amegakure. That's all I ever wanted._

~~***~~

Konohamaru followed Ebisu-Sensei out of the hospital to meet up with the rest of his team. They walked side-by-side in silence, both dealing with the revelation in their own way.

Boss was a Jinchuuriki. As soon as he had heard about the Third's Law, Konohamaru had sought the only person he knew who would _know_ everything about a Jinchuuriki, from what one was to how someone became it. Once he was told, several things that hadn't made sense before did now (Sensei's disdain of boss when they first met, the bitter hatred in their voices whenever his classmates or the Chunin-Sensei from the academy mentioned boss, even how he was able to go up against a Biju and win), and came up with a rough idea of what had happened all those years ago. Boss was a Jinchuuriki; this was a fact and, Konohamaru thought, the reason why boss had become dangerous.

It wasn't.

Because boss – Naruto's (for the person he had met was certainly _not_ his rival or big-brother figure) mother had been a Jinchuuriki as well, and Naruto something called a Child. His very blood had been cursed by the Kyuubi, given birth to a new Kekkei Genkai – and a seemingly eternal connection to the Biju itself. As the Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki, Naruto had been given a death warrant by the Yondaime, his father.

Because the Yondaime was Naruto's father.

It skewed everything Konohamaru ever thought he knew about who could become powerful and who could not. If the Yondaime really was Naruto's father, then everything he ever said about being a nobody rising to greatness was a lie. As the child of both Jinchuuriki and Kage, Naruto was always going to be powerful, and the title of Hokage was a foregone conclusion.

Had Naruto always known about his parents?

Konohamaru's entire worldview had undergone a paradigm shift. He had been raised to believe that everyone in Konoha were family, and that to be a Shinobi meant that he was able to protect his family, fight alongside them as comrades-in-arms. That the Yondaime had forsaken his own family for the family of Konoha...

Had his grandfather known?

Was it even worth pursuing the title of Hokage anymore?

~~***~~

Sakura moved through the crowds with ease, the movements long since become old habit for a Chunin like her. Her eyes scanned each individual head, searching for the elusive spiky locks of sun-blond hair. All around her, the various Shinobi discussed the biggest piece of gossip that was circulating throughout the village.

Naruto's parentage, and the cursed Kekkei Genkai he had been born with.

It was ridiculous, of course– the empty wishes of a scared populous making Naruto out as some tragic figure, to twist his past into something that would make him even more of a messiah to be worshiped. That they would even consider it as truth... It was laughable. Naruto was Naruto, the orphan Jinchuuriki who had once been considered someone unable to make it in the Shinobi profession (academy grades reflected the students' potential, both as a possible legend and whether they can even make it in a world of killers). He wasn't anything special or even tragic – he was just... Naruto.

It had been two days since the Godaime had returned from the Summit, since a state of war had been declared and the entire Shinobi force recalled and given a week to prepare.

Two days since Naruto had returned.

And in those two days, Sakura had done what she could to get her old friends back together, short of drugging them and forcefully bringing all of them to the same location. Few, if any, of those that had been her classmates had wanted to find Naruto and throw him a 'welcome back' party. Shikamaru had explicitly told her that, from what he had seen of Naruto during the war council meetings, Naruto was almost nothing like he had been, and that she was better off just finding her peace with the past and moving on.

But she wouldn't. Not without actually seeing for herself whether Naruto had actually changed, as Sakura suspected Shikamaru was taking pity on her.

Without warning, there was a flash of sunny-blond hair out of the corner of her eye, and Sakura immediately turned to get a better look. Sakura's hopes of him (her?) being Naruto weren't very high, as she'd spotted quite a few blond-haired people in her search, and those that she had approached had not been happy about being mistaken for her old teammate.

This latest person, though, looked _exactly like_ Naruto did, when he had stood in front of her all those times. His (for this person was assuredly a _he_ and not a _she_ ; women, no matter how much they tried to, could not hide the movement of their hips or the way they carried themselves to pass off as a man to the eyes of the well-trained Shinobi, especially those that were inclined towards Genjutsu– attention to detail was what made their illusions so hard to distinguish from reality) hair was the same shade of blonde Naruto's was- _is_ , she reminded herself. Although he was dressed like a civilian ( _mossy blue-green colors like those worn in the Land of Water, with a zip-up hoodie over a fish-net shirt; calloused hands mostly near the knuckles and fingertips, body tense and rigid from years of Taijutsu training, maybe even combat experience – a Shinobi, either Genin or newly minted Chunin_ ) the teen carried himself like a Shinobi. All she needed now was a glimpse of his face and she would know for sure.

The possible-Naruto stopped and moved to the side, directing a teal-haired woman ( _bodice and skirt, long flowing sleeves, greens and browns – civilian clothes; hardened movements, much more tense than males, indicating a greater proficiency in Taijutsu than anything else_ ) towards one of the nicer casual restaurants in this part of Konoha. The blond turned to open the door for his date, and–

Sakura gasped.

It was Naruto.

She followed behind, motioning to the waiter to seat her at the bar, weaving a minor Genjutsu to get placed with a clear line of sight at Naruto. She had no idea who the woman was, or even what was going on with the war, but she was _positive_ that Naruto was right in the middle of it.

~~***~~

Naruto's eyes were unfocused as he absentmindedly moved his chopsticks through the bowl of fried rice before him, his mind unable to move past the corner he had been pushed into. He hadn't really wanted to let the majority of Konoha know about his mother for fear that they might demonize her as he had been (his status as a Child had been reconciled when he had been told that his mother loved him, had wanted him; the stories he had been told about her personality and how much he was like her from Roshi convinced Naruto that he would have been born no matter what– it was where he had gotten his stubborn streak from, after all).

He wanted the image of his mother to remain pure, in his mind.

"Are you okay?" Fu's question brought him back to reality, and Naruto stopped picking at his rice enough to start eating it.

"Not really." He replied before taking a bite, and swallowed the food before continuing. "It couldn't be helped, I guess."

"Your mother." It wasn't a question, and Naruto said nothing in response. The two continued their meal in an awkward silence, used to being prodded into conversation by Utakata and Gaara. The absence of their family was... unsettling.

"Um, the Academy's closed by now, so what do you say we swing by there tomorrow? I can take you to the old ramen stand I went to for lunch after?" Naruto began, giving Fu a small smile. She looked surprised for a moment before nodding, returning his smile with one of her own. It was a small gesture, but a sure sign that he was getting the closure needed. Their eyes met briefly before Fu's flickered to the side and her gaze hardened. Naruto immediately tensed, his hand moving towards his forearm before it stopped; he wasn't wearing his jacket, and had left his weapons back at their room.

"Uzumaki Naruto?"

The voice was soft-spoken, almost lilting in its lighthearted tone. Naruto turned his head, looking up at... a rather nondescript teenager about his age. The boy had short black hair and pale skin, with the most perfect smile on his face. A smile that was too perfect to be real. The boy extended a hand forward for Naruto to shake.

"I am here to invite you to join Elder Danzo for lunch tomorrow." The boy continued without letting Naruto respond.

"And if he declines?" Fu's question was less of a question and more of a statement, and the boy's smile faltered for the slightest of moments before returning full force.

"Elder Danzo does not like being stood up." The boy's eyes opened from the closed position they had been in since first appearing, revealing dull, empty black eyes, and his smile was lost, leaving an emptiness on his face that was beyond words. "It would not be wise of you to decline."

"Is that a threat?" Naruto joined the conversation, placing his hands and forearms flat against the table, ready to move into a better position to attack if needed. The boy, for his part, merely smiled.

"Of course not." The smile widened. "I was merely stating that Elder Danzo has a great amount of pull within the Land of Fire, and it would take no effort on his part to spread an unsavory rumor involving you."

Naruto hated this guy. Everything about him irritated Naruto to no end. Before, he would have openly gone out of his way to make sure this was known to the guy, but all those years being trained by Yagura had instilled a sense of self-preservation – there was no telling whether the person he antagonized was stronger, more well-known than him, or was in close contact with someone with great political weight.

And the person this guy was working for, Elder Danzo, was clearly all of the above.

"If I accept this invitation, and I'm not saying I am, then what would happen?" Naruto asked, his expression guarded. The faux smile returned, and the boy pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket. Naruto's entire body tensed as he eyed the paper warily. Yagura was prone to using Seals in his training, and a number of them were kept hidden on his person on small slips of paper. It was unlikely for Danzo to order the boy to engage in combat against Naruto, but... "What's that?"

"Directions to Elder Danzo's house." The boy replied, placing the folded slip of paper down on the table between the duo. "You will be there at 11:45 exactly. Alone."

The boy's tone was that of finality.

Naruto warily nodded, using his chopsticks to check the paper to see that they were, in fact, directions.

"Well," Naruto began once the disturbing boy had left and the contents of the paper had revealed themselves as being as advertised. "Can I trust you not to offend anyone for a couple hours tomorrow?"

"You have trusted me thus far." Fu replied, lifting her saucer of sake up in the air. "Or were there mitigating circumstances I don't yet know about?"

Naruto laughed, his troubles pushed aside once more.

~~***~~

The next day found Naruto standing in front of the older housing compounds in Konoha, near the base of the mountain. It, like many of the compounds nearest to the mountain, were what encompassed the original Konohagakure. The compounds here and atop the mountain were stylized in the understated minimalist designs from before the formation of the Hidden Village system. Naruto glanced at his watch, shielding his eyes against the glare from the Sun. Eleven forty-three.

Two minutes. Two minutes to decide. Would he step into the spider's den or run from the wolves?

Naruto knew nothing about this Elder Danzo, but he had to be a very dangerous to make such a volatile threat. He was only able to move around the Elemental Nations as freely as he did because the Hokage and the Elders believed him to be dead. If he left, if Naruto didn't attend this lunch meeting...

Would he be able to survive against the Hidden Villages, against the Joint Shinobi Alliance, as a missing-nin for the rest of his life?

Would his family ever forgive him?

The seconds ticked by. Eleven forty-four.

On the other hand... could he live with _himself_ if he didn't go through with it? Naruto had both respected and despised the ideals of Konoha that had caused Namikaze to kill his mother, but would he be able to forgive _himself_ if he turned his back on any sort of reconciliation with his native village?

Was he so blinded by hate, in that regard? Memories of his old teammate flashed through Naruto's mind, of how Sasuke was ignoring the reality around him in order to devote his life towards a single goal – killing the man he hated so much – that he was willing to forsake everything to achieve it.

Naruto didn't want that to happen to him.

Eleven forty-five.

He knocked on the door.

~~***~~

Fu walked across the grounds surrounding the Academy, passing an old wood swing hanging from a lone tree as she swiftly moved towards her destination. Without Naruto to act as mediator, she was left to rely on untested social skills to defend against– _talk to_ Annoyances– _other people_.

She was uncertain that she would be able to survive without him there, at her side, to step in when she didn't know what to do.

Fu moved with determination towards a specific classroom, a specific person. Naruto had mentioned that if she wanted to visit the Academy without him to find his old Chunin-Sensei, Umino Iruka. This 'Iruka-Sensei' was an important figure in Naruto's life, the first person to openly acknowledge him as a _person_.

She approached one of the classrooms, having no intention of searching the entire building for a single person, especially if he might not even be here. She ignored the silence permeating the air around her, believing it to be attributed to the level of discipline Konoha instilled in their Shinobi, and slid open the door.

The classroom was empty.

Sliding the door shut, she tried several other doors (some leading to offices or small dojos) before moving halting all movement. Fu closed her eyes, and dug into her innermost depths of consciousness. She was about to utilize an oft-ignored function of her unique manipulation of Earth Release.

Fu slipped her feet out of her sandals, stepping forward onto the wooden floor of the Academy. Immediately, the vibrations traveled throughout the hallway, bouncing off of each other and giving her an accurate _feel_ of the hallway she was in. Without preamble, Fu lifted her foot and slammed it back into the floor, careful not to have it alter the earth underneath the Academy. The vibrations traveled all throughout the building, painting a highly detailed picture in her mind of the layout of every nook and cranny within the building.

And proving that the Academy was almost completely devoid of life.

"How long have you been following me?" Fu asked, her entire body shifting to prepare for close combat. Behind her, the figure made no move towards her.

"The Academy is closed, you know." The figure said conversationally, waving her hand in the air. "It's weird to see it so empty."

"Who are you?" Fu asked, opening her eyes and turning towards the speaker. She had shoulder-length pink hair framing a heart-shaped face. Green eyes gazed at her warily. They stood there in silence, sizing each other up, for several moments.

"...Haruno Sakura." She finally replied. "You're the woman traveling with Naruto."

"We are a part of the same group, yes." Fu replied, not relaxing her guard.

"Are you like Naruto?" Sakura asked, her eyes becoming unfocused. "Are you a Jinchuuriki? Which Biju do you hold?"

"Those are overly intimate questions." Fu stated, bending low to the ground. "I will not deign to answer them."

"But the two of you are intimate with one another." It wasn't a statement, and Fu's fingers clenched into a fist over the straps of her sandals. "I'm a Genjutsu user, so I have to notice little details like that." There was a pause. "I'm only asking out of Naruto's best interests–"

"And who are you," Fu hissed, defensive. "To presume yourself to know what is and is not good for Naruto?"

"His friend." Sakura responded, glaring at Fu once more. "His teammate. His family."

"Naruto has a family." Fu growled, standing up to her full height. " _I_ am his family. Gaara, Yagura, Roshi, _they_ are his family. _Our_ family. _You_ are not family. Stop deluding yourself into thinking you are."

"I care about Naruto!" Sakura argued, slamming her fist into the wall and blocking Fu's way. "We went through more together than the he ever did with you! I became stronger to stand beside him and... him and Sasuke. What do you have that he would ever want?"

Tears filled Sakura's eyes by the time she finished talking, and Fu strode past her, a look of contempt on her face. She paused at the end of the hallway.

"You lack understanding." Her words were soft. "The life of a Jinchuuriki is such that none but another Jinchuuriki can truly understand it. Humanity treats us a weapons of war, only useful to point at fellow humans to slaughter. Outside of war, we are barely tolerated by humanity. You act as though you _allow_ us the honor of walking beside you, giving us the illusion that we are just like you."

"That's wrong! You're wrong! We never– I never..." Sakura trailed off, her breaths coming in short gasps. Fu snorted in derision.

"Humans." She turned away. "So blind to your own shortcomings. So selfish."

"We're at war to protect you!" The declaration froze Fu in her tracks. "All of us are putting our lives on the line to keep you alive. Most of us will die _for you_. How is that selfish?"

"For a very simple reason." Fu replied, glancing over her shoulder. "When we fight, it is because you Shinobi force us to do so in your stead. When we are injured, it is in place of your own injuries. When we are killed, we are not mourned like you do your comrades-in-arms. When we fail our mission, when your fellow Shinobi die because we fail to protect them, we are given hatred and apathy in place of sympathy and comfort."

"I– I don't–" Sakura faltered, and Fu drove the nail deeper.

"This is not a war to protect us, the Jinchuuriki. This is a war to protect yourselves, humans, from your extinction at the power we wield."

~~***~~

On the way to the Hokage Manor, Fu bumped into Naruto, who was walking through the streets aimlessly.

"Naruto?" Fu ran up to him and saw his glazed eyes. She gripped his shoulder and shook it slightly. "What happened during your luncheon with that Elder Danzo?"

Naruto snapped out of his daze, blinking rapidly and held one hand up to shield his eyes from the Sun.

"It was boring." He waved the question aside. "He only asked a few questions about us. Wanted to know my side of the story, how all of us were brought together, and whether I would ever reconsider Tsunade's offer to rejoin the village."

"And what was your response?" She asked more to goad more information out of him (something was _not right_ if he had been wandering around like that).

"Told him to keep an ear out in the streets for the truth, that he was a prying bastard for wanting to know, and that it was too soon to tell." Naruto replied, waving off her concern. "Listen... I've been thinking about it, and I've realized something."

"What realization have you had?" Fu asked, dubious about the answer. The _not right_ thing about Naruto was vanishing with every passing second, but she knew better than to let her guard down just because a possible threat retreated.

"I don't think I'll ever return to Konoha as a Shinobi," Naruto hesitantly began. "But that doesn't mean I can't give myself and my old friends the closure we need."

That... allayed most of Fu's suspicions. It was an epiphany she had been waiting to happen, and was relieved to have it finally occur.

"What brought you to this conclusion?" She had to ask, if for no other reason than to be sure that none of Naruto's actions were being affected by a Genjutsu of some sort. His relationship with Kyuubi had yet to progress to the point where they both fully trusted one another; Kyuubi had yet to give out his name (a achievement that was only given out to each Jinchuuriki when they had gained enough trust in their Biju to be able to access their full powers). She had only recently been bequeathed with the name of the Nanabi no Kabutomushi– Chomei. None of the others knew the name of Kyuubi, as Naruto hadn't yet earned the right to know, and the Biju had agreed not to divulge the names of themselves of their kin until after the Biju in question had given its name. After so long, they were beginning to suspect Naruto would never learn Kyuubi's name.

"I was having second thoughts about meeting with Elder Danzo, and was wondering if I could go through with it." Naruto said, avoiding looking at Fu. "If I could spend the rest of my life being the reason we could never settle down in one place, permanently. If I could live with myself for burning these bridges I have here."

"Shall we let the Hokage know of this, so she can arrange for you to meet with your old comrades, then?" Fu asked, the corners of her mouth twitching upwards.

_Perhaps Naruto will learn Kyuubi's name after all..._


	33. Reunion

"What are _you_ doing here?"

The speaker was one Inuzuka Kiba. His massive ninken, Akamaru, trotting alongside him as they entered the clearing, keeping a wary on on the other occupants. All around him stood the remaining members of the Konoha 12 and their respective Sensei.

"We were summoned by the Hokage, same as you." Shikamaru stated, his eyes trailing across the others in the clearing. At one point, all of them could have claimed to have been friends, but that had ended when they had turned against one another several years before. Now, they were acquaintances, comrades-in-arm that barely tolerated one another.

"It is most likely because we will need to fight alongside one another in the upcoming war." Shino, his face hidden by the high collar of his shirt and the hood of his jacket.

"The inability to trust the person next to you will get many people killed." Neji concurred. "But what I don't understand is why we were sent _here_ of all places."

"This was where team seven was tested to become Genin." Sakura said, gesturing towards the trio of wood posts in the ground a little ways away. "Maybe this has to do with Naruto."

Hinata scoffed, drawing the attention of everyone present.

"That much is obvious." She said, looking at Sakura like an adult would to a young child. "We know Uzumaki the best, and he is the reason we have become the people we are today."

"Hinata!" Kurenai's sharp voice pierced the air, and she stepped out of Asuma's protective hold to lay a hand upon the Hyuga heiress' shoulder, her maternity robe trailing behind her.

"Apologies, Sensei." Hinata relented. "I did not mean to offend."

"It doesn't matter." Shikamaru said, moving away from the tree he leant against. "He's changed just as much as we have. There's no going back to how we were."

Off to the side, Kakashi leaned into the shadow of the trees, nearly out of sight. Sakura gave him one final glance before adding to the conversation.

"That girl he had with him, does anyone know anything about her?" She asked, looking at each of them. "I met her the other day, and she said that we don't know anything about Naruto. I think she might be one of the Jinchuuriki, but she said something that makes me wonder..."

"Ah, Naruto has found a lover?" Lee asked, moving forward in interest.

"She said that we're all selfish." Sakura continued. "That we're all fighting this war to protect ourselves from their wrath."

"'Their wrath'?" Tenten spoke up, glancing at Sakura in confusion. All around her, everyone else was expressing a similar emotion.

"The Jinchuuriki."

"That's a load of bullshit." Kiba stated. "What've they got to be angry at us for?"

"Everything." The new voice drew their attention towards the forest, where Naruto and the mysterious girl were moving towards them.

"Who're you?" Kiba groused, gazing at her guardedly.

"I am Fu, Jinchuuriki of Chomei, the Nanabi no Kabutomushi." The girl, Fu, answered. Immediately, everyone tensed up, on their guards.

"Must you be so dramatic?" Naruto sighed, causing Fu to look at him deadpan.

"I was merely introducing myself." Naruto returned her deadpan stare, and Fu elaborated. "I wasn't aware dramatics were involved in introductions."

"They aren't."

"Why did you have the Hokage bring us all here?" Asuma asked, gesturing to the very pregnant Kurenai. "Not everyone will be heading out to war."

"By now the news should have spread everywhere, so I'll start there." Naruto began. "Who's heard that rumor about my parents and Kyuubi? The one where I've got a Kekkei Genkai?"

One by one, everyone in the clearing raised their hands. Naruto nodded his head and jerked his head towards Kakashi.

"And you?" The man in question stepped into the clearing, his eye closed and exuding casualness.

"You should know better than to underestimate my knowledge, Naruto." He replied genially. "Don't you remember your Genin days?"

"Yes, now answer the question." Naruto deadpanned. Kakashi sighed and fixed the blond with a hard eye.

"How much is true?" Naruto didn't even blink at the question.

"All of it." He responded blithely.

"Impossible." Neji stated. "You would have presented with some sign of a Kekkei Genkai long before now. Even when you were a Genin, there would have been some sign–"

"It's always been there." Naruto replied. "Everyone just figured it was 'cause of Kyuubi."

"Your healing." Kakashi stated, his eye narrowing.

"It's not the most interesting of Kekkei Genkai, I know, but..." Naruto threw his hands up in the air and shrugged his shoulders, as if to say 'what can you do?' "Still, having chakra that naturally heals you does have its' perks."

"That's not possible." The statement drew everyone's attention to Ino. "The average Chakra polarity of a person is too great to boost someone's healing. There have been reported cases where a Shinobi's Chakra polarity made them highly resistant to disease, but healing on that level just isn't possible."

"I had the Seal holding Kyuubi removed and replaced." Naruto replied. "There is no 'not possible'."

The reaction was immediate. Everyone started spouting about how impossible such a thing was, and how he should be dead.

"And yet you say that my introduction was overly dramatic when you so blatantly do such a dramatic thing?" Fu teased, poking Naruto in the arm with a finger. "My, what stunning double standards you hold."

"I got caught in the moment!" Naruto defended himself. "You can't fault me for that."

"You cannot possibly have removed and replaced Sensei's seal." Kakashi stated, his visible eye darkening. "No one possesses such knowledge."

"Did you know," Naruto began, turning to face Kakashi. "that the Uzumaki were once a Clan?"

"What relevance does that have with what Kakashi-Sensei was saying?" Hinata asked, crossing her arms as she focused her eyes on Naruto.

"Because the Uzumaki Clan were unrivaled in their sealing abilities." Naruto replied. "The Seals they created were beyond powerful; just look at Konoha's defensive barrier!"

"They were destroyed in the Second War because of their ability to defend against and counter the Biju, as well as the danger their Seals presented to the Elemental Nations." Fu added.

"And just when did you learn about Sealing jutsu?" Neji asked.

"You weren't the most academically inclined in the Academy." Shino spoke up. "You did not appear to possess the focus necessary to use Sealing jutsu."

"It wasn't when you were traveling with Jiraiya in search of Lady Tsunade." Asuma added. "Or he would have mentioned it."

"...one of the Jinchuuriki is knowledgeable in Sealing jutsu." It was more of a statement than a question. The two stared at each other, everyone appearing to fade into the background as Naruto focused on Kakashi.

"You always were the smartest person I ever knew." Naruto finally replied. "But then again, you don't become Yondaime Mizukage when you're a Jinchuuriki without learning from the best."

"Is this wise?" Fu asked, looking at Naruto warily. "I thought that the details of our kin and our travels weren't to be discussed."

"They're gonna know about us anyway." Naruto reasoned. "Kinda pointless to fight a war if they don't know who they're fighting to protect."

"We are fighting this war in your stead?" Hinata asked at the exact moment Sakura spoke up.

"What do they want to do with you?"

Naruto glanced from one woman to the other, both fixing the other with the most scathing glare they could give. The air seemed to literally crackle with sparks and Naruto fully expected the ground to explode in a towering display of burning death in a cosmic personification of Sakura and Hinata's animosity towards one another.

He wasn't gonna go near _that_ minefield if he could help it.

Around them, the remaining members of the Konoha 12 split off, with team eight and Neji (very reluctantly) standing near Hinata while Ino glared the rest of team ten to join her and Lee behind Sakura. The Jonin-Sensei milled about near the treeline, their focus more on the Jinchuuriki duo than anyone else in the clearing. Tenten watched them all, glancing over the Jonin-Sensei, to the separate factions that the group had separated into, before moving towards Naruto. She stood before him, looking him over before, with a flickering glance at Fu, punching him.

"You insulted all of us." Tenten told the hunched over blond, her punch having drawn the attention of everyone. "You were the one person that brought all of us together, that made all of us friends, and you destroyed that. We aren't the same people we were then, and none of us are the Shinobi we expected to become back then. You want forgiveness? Fine; I forgive you. Hell, everyone here was looking for a reason to do that. You want us to be your friends again? Not one of us stopped advocating the beliefs you pounded into us. But if you think we're _ever_ gonna go back to being the happy, tight-knit group of friends..." Here Tenten trailed off and let out a mirthless laugh. "Sakura idolizes you, Hinata hates your guts, and none of us wants to put our trust in you.

"This Akatsuki wants to start a war against the Elemental Nations? Yeah, I'll fight. I'll fight to keep them from destroying the world. I'll fight to keep Konoha alive. Akatsuki needs the Biju to win? I'll keep the Biju from getting into their hands. But if you want me to fight this war for _you_? If you want any of us to go out and _die_ in this war, for _you_? I'd sooner throw you at your enemy than fight on your behalf." Tenten sighed. "But I can't. I won't."

"So, you hate me?" Naruto asked, swinging his hands in a wide gesture to indicate the whole of Konoha. "Forgive, but never forget?"

"That's right." Tenten replied, a guttural growling coming from behind her – either from Kiba or the bear-sized Akamaru – in agreement. "We're gonna fight this war, but not for you. It's gonna be for Konoha."

"Konoha–" Naruto heatedly began, only for a gloved hand to come down between the two.

"That's enough." Kakashi stated, moving to stand before Naruto. "You were wronged by the village, but we're trying to atone for that. The only think stopping you from moving on is yourself. I'm going to give you advice I once gave Sasuke: don't lose yourself to your hatred. The moment you realize that there's more important things in life, it'll be too late to do anything about it."

"Is that what happened to you?" Fu interjected, and there was an air of unease following that question. The Jonin-Sensei were double-taking between the two Jinchuuriki and Kakashi while the rest of the Konoha 12 (or rather, since Naruto wasn't forthcoming about returning as a Shinobi, and Sasuke was... gone, Konoha 10) were watching the exchange from the corner of their eyes.

"That's not something we should be discussing." Gai stepped between the Jinchuuriki and Kakashi, his sudden appearance causing the two to take a step back.

"Kid." Asuma spoke up, drawing Naruto's attention. "Back at my place I've got a rookie Genin of a nephew going through his weapon stores, soldiering through a betrayal that shouldn't have happened. He keeps muttering to himself about whether or not it's worth it going for the title of Hokage anymore, and every so often mentions you. Why d'you hate Konoha?"

"I don't." Naruto instantly replied. "I just hate its ideals."

There was no verbal response; instead, everyone became tensed, identifying those words as dangerous, as treasonous.

"Konoha is a model Hidden Village." Gai responded. "It is the strongest of the five greater Hidden Villages, and one that all others strive to emulate."

"It's not the village itself." Naruto replied with an exaggerated eyeroll. "It's what it stands for. Or, if you wanna get all technical, what you're taught to believe is more important above all else."

"Teamwork." Sakura breathed, recalling team seven's very first lesson.

"The village always comes first." Kiba stated. "What about it?"

"My father gave his life to turn me into a Jinchuuriki." Naruto answered. "From what I've been able to get outta Kyuubi, my mother was willing to take him back in; was planning to take him with her to the death. But Namikaze, my dad, summoned," Naruto faltered and shuddered, remembering with too-much clarity the almighty god's power over life and death. "summoned the Shinigami. He Sealed half of Kyuubi in himself, binding it to his soul to be consumed by the Shinigami, and was dead-set on Sealing the other half in me."

"Because he wanted you to have the strength of the Kyuubi."

"Because he wanted _Konoha_ to have the strength of Kyuubi." Naruto countered. "He cared more for Konoha having a Jinchuuriki, especially one that's a Child, than he did for his own lover and son."

"You can't prove that." Ino cut in, and Kiba jumped to Namikaze's defense as well.

"What's to say he really didn't want you to have that power for yourself?"

"Why does being a 'Child' make you a better Jinchuuriki?" Neji asked, and the clearing fell silent as everyone waited for Naruto to answer. The blond in question shared a look with Fu (who had no authority on the matter), before answering the question.

"We can call on our Biju's Yokai more easily, and hold amazing control over it." Naruto replied, turning to face the Konoha 10. "As for why I don't believe he wanted me to have Kyuubi... didn't you hear the Godaime when she declared the Fourth War? I'm the great, prophesied savior of the Elemental Nations."

"You're not." The sudden outburst came from an unlikely source: Sakura. She almost looked distressed by the proclamation. "You aren't. You can't be."

Kiba snorted. "You just don't want him to be the great savior of the world."

"She would not be the first." Shino added.

"Sakura's dismissal of Naruto is not one to be admired." Lee finally spoke up, and it brought everyone else into the discussion.

"I don't know." Choji stated, throwing a sidelong glance at Naruto. "I mean, no offense, but you aren't really the kind of person I'd imagined would save the world."

"That's because the idea of a single person reshaping the Elemental Nations is beyond comprehension." Neji said. "The sheer scope of it cannot be fathomed."

The discussion was so internal, so divided, that Naruto wondered if it would be easier just to leave them be and let them sort it all out by themselves. When he mentioned this to Fu, however, she was disinclined to do so. Instead, the duo moved towards the Jonin-Sensei, waiting for the topic of whether or not a single person could change the workings of the Elemental Nations. Any attempts to strike up friendly conversation with the Jonin-Sensei (especially where the pregnant Kurenai was concerned) were shot to hell when Hinata shot forward, her palms ablaze with chakra.

"You are not a god." She planted a foot atop the dirt wall Fu had created to block her, and jumped up and over it. "You are not something to be worshiped." Her first strike failed to make contact, Naruto having had jumped backwards as soon as she was close enough that she couldn't change trajectory. Her other hand snapped out, crumbling the wall of rock Fu shot out at her into dust before she leapt into the air, once more after Naruto. "You are not something to be idolized." Her hands snapped out, striking the Tenketsu in Kakashi's left clavicle, mid-torso and right upper thigh , halting his attack in its tracks. With a spin, her legs made contact with Fu, who had rushed forward to stop Hinata. Fu went flying backwards, slamming into Asuma and stopping the man's attack. This time she rushed towards Naruto without obstacle, the rest of the Konoha 10 blocked off behind her by the earthen wall made by Fu. Her right hand exploded in a great flame of chakra, forming the shape of a dragon's head. "You are trash, scum of the highest order, and you need to be stopped."

Naruto's leg snapped out, his entire upper body ducking low to the ground to further his reach as well as slip underneath her attack. His foot made contact with her chest, the sudden halt in her momentum furthered her injury, and she was bent double over his leg. For the briefest of moments, time seemed to stop, both frozen as they were, and their eyes made contact. Hinata's face was contorted in rage, but her eyes and mouth were wide in shock, pain, and betrayal; Naruto's face was impassive, and his eyes were filled with a sort of chilled fury. The moment was broken, however, when the earthen wall separating the rest of the Konoha 10 from them was rent asunder, and Hinata slid down to the ground as Naruto righted himself.

"You're right." Naruto said, as the oncoming group separated themselves as part moved towards Hinata, and the rest towards him. "I am not a god, or an idol, or some hero to be worshiped." He turned his gaze upon the rest of the group, and they faltered, splitting off to check on the downed Jonin-Sensei, but their attention never left him. "You were already friends with each other without me there. I may have split a rift between your friendship, but that doesn't mean I'm willing to fix it for you. All of you went on without me. Became stronger without me. It may have been to spite me, or to be strong enough to stand beside me when I returned, but now you have to stand together, fight together, be the people that you trust to watch your back, to keep you alive so you can do the same for them. None of you can expect to survive long against the monsters that exist within Akatsuki if you're waiting for the Shinobi next to you to die so you can feel better about yourselves. You will die, and the Shinobi around you will die, and then the war will be lost, and everyone, everything you fought for will be gone."

"Naruto?" Fu looked at him like before, when he had done something that she didn't understand. All around him, everyone was looking at him like they'd never seen him before.

"Yeah?" And suddenly his voice was hoarse, his throat was closed up, he was taking short, shallow breaths. And there was wetness all down his cheeks, as well as trailing from his nostrils to his lips.

Naruto was crying.

"I–" It's hard to talk, and he wondered how he'd managed to say so much, and when during his rant it had begun. "You have a life here. Family." He gets out, and finds that it's slowly getting easier to breathe. Short sentences. Short words. Breath in; breath out, long and slow. "I don't. Not – not anymore. Accept it."

~~***~~

"He's crying."

"He's finally gotten closure." Jiraiya remarked, leaning over Tsunade's shoulder to gaze into the scrying orb. "It's long overdue, by the looks of it."

Tsunade hesitated before responding. "Do you think we did the right thing, three years ago?"

"No." He immediately replied. At Tsunade's harsh look, though, he elaborated. "We had no idea what was wrong. And besides," He added with a rueful grin. "would we have been any better off if we hadn't?"

"Akatsuki would have almost all of the Biju." Tsunade mused. "And none of us would have noticed, because the Jinchuuriki wouldn't have been vanishing so quickly."

"And we'd be left with one potentially insane, unfit for battle Jinchuuriki, and a Joint Alliance between the five greater Hidden Villages." Jiraiya continued.

"Against eight Biju and at least ten S-Rank Shinobi." Tsunade countered, and the two fell into silence.

"Danzo had a private lunch with Naruto, I hear." Jiraiya lightly commented, and Tsunade glanced at him from the corner of her eye, her fingers intertwined in front of her face.

"What's his angle?" She asked, thinking out loud. "With the war coming, you'd think he'd lie low, waiting until we've all killed one another to swoop in with the other vultures."

"That _is_ more his style." Jiraiya concurred. "He's never been this overt."

"And when he is, there's always something else; some catch that's part of a bigger plan that we won't figure out until he's achieved whatever-it-is." _And this time he'll succeed_. The words don't need to be spoken.

"We'll win this war." Jiraiya said, staring out the window and watching the village prepare itself for battle. "Danzo's probably planning something for after."

"That's what I'm afraid of." Tsunade replied.


	34. Confer

There exists a very fine line between love and hate. It can't quite be defined with mere words, but with emotions. Jealousy, betrayal, disappointment, these emotions and more do not just define that line, but _are_ that line. These emotions are what someone feels when they love another.

Hyuga Hinata had loved Naruto. She had viewed him as a braver, more confident version of her, someone who was looked down upon and belittled by everyone around him (like she was by her family) but somehow had a measure of self-confidence Hinata did not. She idolized him in a way no one else did, believing with her heart of hearts that if he can find it in himself to believe in himself, then so can she. And so she loved Naruto.

And Hinata knew, deep down, that no matter how much she told herself that she hated him, and felt that sharp spike of anger well up inside her every time she heard his name, that she still loved Naruto. She would always love him, she had been in love for far too long to know how to live her life without that love, that adoration and ideal to live towards. Even when Naruto belittled her, and she felt nothing less than betrayal and despair at what her idol thought of her, Hinata still couldn't bring herself to truly hate him. Despise him, yes, with all her heart, but not truly hate him. So she buried her love under hate.

Even when she learned of his status as Jinchuuriki, and when rumor of his being a Child (something only heard of in the most ancient historical records of the Hyuga as the source of the Byakugan) spread throughout all of Konoha, she still couldn't bring herself to forgive, or even pity, him. To do so would mean acknowledging that she still loved him.

And she just couldn't ( _wouldn't_ ) admit that to anyone. Not even herself.

~~***~~

Jiraiya watched Naruto from his vantage point atop the roofs. He was under no delusions that neither the blond nor his girlfriend didn't know he was there; they already knew about the ANBU team that had been shadowing them their first day in Konoha. He was watching, and waiting. Waiting for the perfect chance to get Naruto alone. There were too many questions that needed to be answered, to many mysteries surrounding the boy to just leave be.

Why did Naruto remove his Seal and replace it? More importantly, how did he replace the Seal? Jiraiya was skilled with Sealing, but he was sure such a thing wasn't possible.

What sort of control did he have over the Kyuubi? That destructive jutsu used against Pein (Nagato, Yahiko, Kami knew whichever of them it really was, or whether it really _was_ them) was unlike anything Jiraiya had even comprehended, and felt like a negative version of Nature Energy (something so unnatural couldn't possibly come from nature; the Biju were fearsome creatures indeed).

How, precisely, did his Kekkei Genkai work? Surely there was something more to it than basic healing.

What was Naruto angry at: Konoha, his father, or Tsunade and Jiraiya? The boy had made several comments to different people about which he was really angry at, but none of them held the absolute truth that drove the boy across the line from love to hate.

And then there was the most important question, one which anyone involved in Naruto's... misplacement, had likely forgotten or just about overlooked as irrelevant.

What on Earth could possibly have stricken Naruto's name from the Toad Summoning Contract? When someone signed a Summoning Contract, they signed in blood, and essentially gave a blood oath that _could not_ be broken. Not even death removed someone's name from a Summoning Contract; even if the Summoner died and was brought back to life, they would still have a contract with the animal they had signed a contract with. The Summoning Contract bound a person's _soul_ to their Summons, and nothing short of reincarnation could break a person of that contract.

And the only way Jiraiya could think of to get a straight answer out of the blond to any of those questions, especially concerning the Summoning Contract, was to bring the boy before the Great Elder Sage at Myoboku. Only he would be able to divine the truth, and put to rest Jiraiya's lingering doubts about whether or not the boy was the savior of the world – or the one who would bring apocalypse upon the world.

Jiraiya had to know, one way or the other. If Naruto was the savior, he would do everything in his power to ensure the prophecy would come to pass. If he wasn't... well. The prophecy _did_ say that Jiraiya would be the one to decide which path the savior would take.

Oh! Naruto and his girl were on the move, and about to run into his old teammate (and old crush). If he moved now, then his actions were totally justified – no man would ever want to be caught in a confrontation between current and ex-girlfriends. Naruto would ultimately thank him, in the end.

He leapt forward, nothing less than a phantom breeze as Jiraiya flew through the air to appear in front of Naruto and his girl (he really should make an effort to remember the girl's name – she _was_ one of the Jinchuuriki they were going to war over, after all; not to mention, he really wanted to let loose with all the tips and relationship pointers he'd compiled for Naruto over the years, once the blond warmed up to the older man) in a blur of color and dust clouds dissipating around his feet.

"Official business, kids." Jiraiya told the duo, standing straight and clapping his hands on the two teens shoulders, stopping whatever jutsu the blond had been prepping in response while the girl was steadfastly maintaining a Taijutsu stance. He tried to take a step forward, but was met with resistance in the form of miniature pillars of earth that were encompassing his feet. He stamped his feet, breaking the shackles before fixing the girl with a bland look. "Charming. But I need to borrow your boyfriend for a while. Don't worry," Jiraiya held out a had to prevent either of them protesting. "you'll be getting him back unharmed. Nothing _too_ invasive will happen, I promise."

And without letting them reply, Jiraiya hoisted the blond over his shoulders and clapped his hands together, instigating a reverse summoning. The two exploded into smoke as a cry of "Naruto!" came from behind.

Yeah, Naruto would totally thank Jiraiya for it afterwords.

~~***~~

"Naruto..." The pink-haired Chunin trailed off as Lord Jiraiya (with Naruto over his shoulder) vanished in an explosion of smoke, leaving Sakura alone with Fu. Again. "Dammit..."

"You!" Sakura suddenly found herself lodged up to her neck in rock staring down an angry girlfriend. "Where was Naruto taken?"

"Lord Jiraiya summons toads." Sakura replied, considerably calmer than the woman before her. "Naruto is most likely in the land of the Summons, wherever the toads reside."

"Oh." The rock lowered back into the ground, freeing Sakura from its clutches. She watched as Fu looked at her intently before turning around and walking towards Hokage Manor. Sakura blinked.

"W-wait!" She dashed forward, placing her hand on the other girl's shoulder.

Sakura had to perform a back-flip to dodge the wall of earth that rose up to separate the two.

"Do _not_ touch me." Fu intoned, her entire body tense. "I will harbor _no_ unwarranted contact."

Sakura faltered mid-crouch, confused over the appearance of that trait.

"I wasn't going to..." She trailed off at the realization that yes, she was, and that a majority of people would have as well and what kind of physical contact had Fu had to hate being touched so much–

"Yes, you were." Fu cut across Sakura's line of thought, and the earthen wall returned to the ground with a sweep of the teal-haired girl's hand. "That's what you do, isn't it? Do something and then completely deny it ever happened?"

Sakura had the feeling that Fu was talking about something much different than the Chunin's perceived transgression.

"Look," Sakura began, holding up her hands in a placating gesture. "I don't want any trouble. It's just..." Sakura trailed off, unsure what to say to the woman before her. "I wanted to speak to Naruto. Talk to him and get the answer to a question I've had for a long time now."

"Then why are you still talking to me?" Fu demanded, unhappy with the way the conversation was going.

"Because..." Sakura sighed. "I thought I knew him, but it turns out that you know him far better than I ever will. Apparently I never knew either of them, in the end, and I just – I want to know."

"Know?" Fu honestly looked curious, and tilted her head to the side in confusion. "Know what?"

It's just, he fought monsters like Gaara and Zabuza, and was able to make them see things like he did." Sakura explained, barely noticing the way Fu stiffened at the word 'monsters'. "So what was different that time? Why wasn't he able to bring Sasuke back?"

But Fu did not hear Sakura; instead, the teal-haired woman was lost in her own world, gazing at Sakura with thinly-veiled disgust.

"Gaara is no monster." Her voice was soft and extremely clipped, and cut into Sakura like the chill winds of autumn through the air. "If he ever was, it was one of humanity's own making."

"Oh. I didn't – I mean–" Sakura tried to backtrack, although it was clear by that point that Fu would never like others, and would only open up to another Jinchuuriki.

"It doesn't matter." Fu interrupted, turning to walk away. "Humanity faces its end at monsters of its' own creation – the Akatsuki – and will inevitably turn to those they deny the existence of to save it– the Jinchuuriki and our Biju."

"How can you say that?" Sakura protested, moving to stand in the way of the older woman. "How can you hold humanity in such low regard, yet rely on us to fight Akatsuki in your stead?"

Her words struck a nerve in the Nanabi Jinchuuriki, for the woman halted in her tracks, entire form stiff as a statue.

"You know nothing." The words came with not a small amount of hatred and loathing that Sakura took a step back in shock. The air started to become saturated in chakra that twisted and writhed against the skin like countless maggots, digging in and projecting a fearsome sense of bloodlust and death – killer intent. Fu's head turned towards Sakura, and violet eyes could be seen through strands of teal hair, their pupil-less depths betraying a measure of pure _hate_ that became directed at Sakura. The maggots digging into her skin became a single solid entity pressing down upon her from all sides, as though she had been buried alive and was being crushed underneath the weight of the earth. "I was but a small babe when my family gave me up to become the new Jinchuuriki of Chomei, the Nanabi. I had the Biju placed within me, and upon completion of the Sealing everything I ever had was taken away. Whatever name I might have had before the Sealing was forgotten and I was given the appellation of 'Fu', the Wind, and treated as little more than a pet in their eyes. I had no family. I had no friends. I had _nothing_ to my identity outside of what others said of me. In time I grew to loathe humans, and sought to emulate them if only to carve out an identity that was _mine_ , not theirs. I hold humanity in such low regard because they deny the existence and identity of both Jinchuuriki and Biju. My reliance upon you is only reciprocation of the reliance you humans have ever held upon me; upon all Jinchuuriki. Treat others as you yourself have been treated, of course."

Sakura could say nothing, could do nothing to contradict Fu or strip her of her beliefs. Such things were best left to Naruto, who had a natural ability to shift world-views with only a few simple words and the exchanging of fists. Except... Fu had been with Naruto for almost three years, and if her world-view hadn't changed in that time, then what could be done to make the teal-haired woman any more sympathetic towards the rest of humanity?

~~***~~

"What _is_ this place?" Naruto asked, back on his feet after Jiraiya unceremoniously dropped him onto the ground. He gazed at the scenery around him in equal parts awe and terror, something that Jiraiya took more than a small amount of pleasure in seeing.

"Welcome to Mount Myoboku, home of the almighty Toad Summons!" Jiraiya swung his arms out wide in a grand gesture, the too-large grin on his face holding a hint of nostalgia. Naruto's reaction was much too much like that of his father, Minato, when the older man had been taken to Myoboku for the first time as well.

"Toad Summons!" Naruto turned to face Jiraiya, the terror eclipsed by the shock of the situation. Above them, a massive frond-leaf shuddered as a drop of dew fell down, and Naruto jumped about a foot in the air as it crashed down near him, the massive water bubble exploding and engulfing everything around it in a ten-foot radius, soaking the blond to the bone. All around them, toads of various sizes, ranging from the size of a mouse to those that could eclipse an apartment building with no effort, burst out laughing at the blond's misfortune. Jiraiya stood amidst the toads, having had enough sense to avoid staying under the cover of the leaves for too long, and burst out laughing as the blond took to sulking, his face contorted into the most ridiculous pout the Sannin had ever seen. " _Why_ are we here?"

"Because," Jiraiya stifled his laughter, his visage becoming more serious than before. "You can't summon them anymore."

Naruto blinked at that, and his pout was replaced with dubious curiosity.

"Mind giving me a bit more here? I'm not _that_ smart." This time it was Jiraiya's turn to blink. Surely Naruto had known, right? At the elder man's nonplussed look, the blond elaborated. "I mean, isn't that what happens when someone stops summoning an animal – they can't summon it anymore?"

"No." Gods, the boy had no idea. "A Summoning Contract is eternal – it _can't_ be broken. Ever."

He could literally see the teen's cogs turning as he realized what the Sannin was saying. And before Jiraiya could start explaining the reason why Naruto was brought to Myoboku, the blond had bit his thumb and was halfway through the hand signs when Jiraiya forcibly separated the blond's hands.

"NO!" _How_ the boy hadn't injured, let alone killed, himself by now was beyond me. " _Idiot_! None that have tried a Summoning in the land of their Summons were ever seen or heard from again! Have you never thought that there was a _reason_ so few Summoning Contracts existed? Too many Summoners vanished for the Summons to maintain a Contract."

"Okay." Naruto yanked his hands free, bringing his blood-covered thumb to his mouth, licking it clean to reveal pristine skin. The Sannin was unnerved at the casual manner the blond had to the taste of blood. "I was just curious; can't blame me for that."

He liked the kid, but sometimes there was just so much _Kushina_ in the boy's actions that Jiraiya wondered whether _anything_ of Minato got passed down.

"No Summoning." Jiraiya may have had a soft spot for the son of his prize student, but he had no patience for idiocy. "Now come. You wouldn't believe how hard it was to get the Great Toad Sage to see you."

"...the what?" Jiraiya ignored the question, keeping his brisk stride while the blond ran to keep pace. "Hey! Hey, don't ignore me; answer the question. Hey!"

Some things, it seemed, never changed.

~~***~~

"Who are you?"

Naruto sighed, watching as the giant geezer toad asked for Jiraiya's and his names. Again. For the third time in as many minutes. He was seriously questioning whether his removal from the Toad Summoning Contract was a _bad_ thing.

"This is Uzumaki Naruto and Jiraiya-boy, Honorable Geezer." The tiny toad on the smaller dais to the geezer toad's right said. Again. "Now quit playing around and get to it."

"Pa!" The female toad on the dais to the geezer toad's left called out to her counterpart. "Be more respectful; d'you really wanna set such a bad example for the young'un here?"

Naruto honestly found it ironic that he and this Pa Toad (one of the oldest and most venerable of the Toad Summons, as well as one of the strongest) were of the same opinion of the geezer toad.

"Do not fight." Geezer toad admonished the bickering duo. "Couples such as you should not argue." The two quieted down, and Naruto was left under the piercing gaze of the geezer toad. "I was very reluctant to meet you, you know."

"Why?" He really should work on speaking before thinking. Especially before he got sassy at beings that were about as strong, if not stronger, than he was.

Like right now.

"It is not easy to be removed from a Summoning Contract." Geezer toad sounded deadly serious, making Naruto uncomfortable at the tone. "It is possible to do so, but it leaves a stain upon the soul, a black mark that affects their entire existence." Geezer toad exhaled, and his eyes opened their widest. "In my old age, I have seen this occur twice before." Behind Naruto, Jiraiya gasped, but geezer toad continued. "Both times I was asked to divine their future by their former Summons. Both times I saw cataclysmic tragedy unlike any before, with a vastly changed world coming after. The world-changing cataclysm was stopped in both cases, but what I saw both times has forever haunted me. It is only at the behest of Jiraiya, Gamabunta, and Ma and Pa that you stand before me today. Uzumaki Naruto, I have divined your future."

The silence that followed was palpable, and weighed heavily upon the air. As the seconds passed, however, the tension vanished, replaced with an increasing amount of awkwardness. Naruto was left standing there under what he hoped wasn't the gaze of a dead toad.

After a minute passed, the blond turned to the Sannin, uncertainty hanging like a cloud over his face.

"Um," He began, not really sure how to best say it. "No disrespect for the scary toad elder, but... he is still, uh, among the living, right?"

"I am not dead." When Naruto retold this encounter to the others later, he was going to admit having jumped several feet in the air; he was going to include the near-heart attack the toad caused; he was _not_ , however, going to give Utakata the satisfaction of learning that the blond had shrieked at an embarrassingly high pitch. "I was merely gathering my wits. What I have divined from your muddled future is the absolute best anyone could hope to achieve."

"What did ya see?" Pa toad asked, and Naruto didn't think he was more glad that there were others there, because he did _not_ want scary geezer toad's eyes fixed on him again.

"I have been asked by many of the other Summons to divine the futures of Summoners that had the potential to become gods among men, and none of their futures were so mired in the black as yours is, Uzumaki Naruto." Geezer toad explained, and a chill swept along and deep into Naruto's spine that could not be warmed by the heavy, humid air of Myoboku. "I searched far and wide into your future, but could see little outside of the black stain of death the likes of which should not be possible." Well, if that wasn't the most ominous warning ever given, Naruto didn't know what was. "What little I was able to see, however, spoke of the Gods themselves, an Earth stained with the blood of countless creatures, and beings whose very existence is rejected by Nature. Uzumaki Naruto," The geezer toad leaned forward, his eyes slitted open and radiating nothing less than a hatred that cut far deeper into him than Naruto was safe acknowledging. "the only possible way to remove your future from the black cesspool of death and destruction, and by extension the whole of existence, is with your own death, here and now."

" _What?_ " That wasn't because he'd insinuated the geezer was dead, was it? Because, really; there were better ways to get back at him than say he needed to die. He looked to the others in the room for confirmation that what the geezer toad had said was a joke, but they were as shocked as him. "He's not serious, right? Right?"

Their lack of immediate response did nothing to bolster Naruto's hope, and prompted him to talk the now-extremely scary geezer toad out of killing the blond.

"That's not really a–"

"You've really gone senile this time, haven't ya?" Pa toad interrupted, and Naruto's argument was lost as Jiraiya made himself known.

"Even if that is the wisest choice of action, we just can't do that." All eyes went towards the Sannin, while Naruto kept thinking of some reason for the geezer toad to reconsider having him killed. "Akatsuki wants the Biju, and so far we've been pretty lucky not to have them get their hands on any of them. Even if half of the Kyuubi was Sealed within the Shinigami, it's still much stronger than any of the other Biju, and we can't let that get into Akatsuki's hands."

_That's it!_

"I was touched by the Shinigami!" The words barely left his mouth when Naruto realized just what he was about to do. "The Dead Demon Consuming Seal was going to kill me, so I was kinda... temporarily killed and convinced the Shinigami to undo the Seal, giving back the half of Kyuubi it – he took."

"You _what_?" Naruto blinked, amazed that Jiraiya's voice could become such a high-pitched squeak. "Are you an _idiot_? No one has met the Shinigami and come back, let alone bartered favor of it! And undo the Seal? That's just–"

"It was a trade!" Naruto interrupted. He didn't like that he had been forced to tell another of his meeting with the god of death, but he'd be damned if anyone else learned of the exact details. "We bartered a trade, alright? I gave him my connection to Kyuubi as a Child, and in return, he undid the Seal and released the souls taken as payment for it – half of Kyuubi and Namikaze."

"Touched by the Shinigami..." Geezer toad mused, cutting off any response Jiraiya may have had. "Perhaps it would explain why your future is so muddled in death and devastation. It is unknown how deeply such a thing would affect you, however, given how I was unable to divine your future." The elderly toad nodded to itself. "But take heed – what I was able to divine of your future will come to pass, one way or another. I only pray to the gods that when catastrophe does come, you are the one to end it, and not bring it."

With that said, the elderly toad leaned back, his eyes closing and breathing evening out. For the briefest of seconds, Naruto had panicked that the geezer toad had died, but let out a sigh of relief that the toad elder was only asleep. The sigh became giggles, and soon Naruto was laughing, a wide grin on his face. His arms were raised as he intertwined his fingers at the back of his neck, shoulders shaking from the repressed laughter.

The laughter was short-lived, however, when the collar of his jacket was fisted under Jiraiya's grip and the blond was dragged from the room.

"Let go!" Naruto protested, gripping the Sannin's wrist while his feet skidded along the ground, searching for a solid hold. For the briefest of moments, Jiraiya paused in his movement, allowing Naruto enough time to plant his feet firmly on the ground enough to jump off it and into a spin along his hold over the elder man's arm. He snapped out a blind kick, his vision obscured by his shirt getting pulled up over his head as the Sannin's grip on the collar didn't relinquish in the slightest, only for the kick to be blocked by the man's other hand. The slack in his shirt was the only warning Naruto got before he was flying through the air and rolling along the damp earth, arms crossed low over his chest to defend against the kick that had sent him flying. Before he could even recover from that, the front of his shirt was bunched up and the blond was hoisted into the air.

"Are you an _idiot_?" Jiraiya sounded angrier than the blond had ever heard the man, and Naruto had no idea why. "Do you realize what you've done?"

"I got the geezer toad off of my back. What'd you expect me to do, just let him kill me?" Naruto argued, wondering just what kind of idiot would stand by and let some senile geezer toad decide their life.

"If you're making deals with the Shinigami, yes." Jiraiya retorted. "Do you seriously think that just giving up a piece of your soul is enough to appease a god? You're now in it's debt, and I do not pity you when the Shinigami comes calling to cash in."

"It – it won't." Naruto's voice wavered, though he couldn't tell whether it was out of fear or anger. "The curse of a Child was sufficient payment, he said so himself."

"I doubt that was the truth." Jiraiya deadpanned, and Naruto tried very hard not to dredge up memories best left forgotten.

_And oh, what a soul it is._

Naruto shivered, thought he could not place the reason why.

_So pure and innocent._

It felt like a chill was dragging itself up along his spine.

_I do so hope you remain the same when you die._

Like a freezing hand was reaching deep inside him, caressing his soul with fingertips ghosting up against him as though he were made of glass.

_I'd like nothing better than to keep it to myself, studying it, picking it apart piece by piece just to see what makes it tick._

"It – he wasn't lying." Naruto's voice was thick, and his breaths came short and quick. "It was sufficient."

_A soul like yours is once in a millennia. Every time they come along, I enjoy myself immensely when I come for it._

"Hey. Hey, Naruto, breathe. Breathe! Naruto!" Jiraiya's frantic voice sounded faded, distant, like the whisper of a dying echo to Naruto's ears as the blond realized the truth of the elder man's words.

His soul was owed to the Shinigami, payment due whenever the god decided to kill him.

"...my soul." He whispered in-between long, slow breaths. "He wants my soul. When I die, he's going to own it."

Jiraiya was silent, and Naruto didn't think the man would be able to say anything to lighten the situation any.

_**We will fight to the last. He will not destroy your afterlife.** _

The foreign thought was a whisper in the back of his mind, and it took Naruto a few seconds to place the origin.

_Kyuubi? Why–_

_**You braved the God of Death to restore me to normal. While you may have been acting in your self-interest at the time, the fact remains that the act benefited me more than it did you. I do not take such kindness lightly.** _

_Was that... a compliment? Have I finally earned the right to know your name?_

_**No. You're still too much of an idiot.** _

Naruto could just _hear_ the deadpan voice of Kyuubi mocking him.

 _Jerk._ Naruto replied, although he did his best to convey the lightheartedness of the retort.

The blond was brought back to reality with a slap to the face.

"Why'd you do that?" Naruto demanded, rubbing the hand-print that was outlined in red on his face.

"Because you completely spaced out on me, brat!" Jiraiya retorted. "Can't you even pay attention when someone's trying to cheer you up?"

"And how am I supposed to do that when you're doing things like pushing me off a cliff, slamming me into a tree and slapping me every time I turn around?" Naruto argued, jabbing a finger at the man. "It's a wonder I learned anything from you back then!"

"Me, teach you anything?" Jiraiya bit back the rest of his response as he watched the red, inflamed skin of Naruto's face fade away, leaving no sign the boy had ever been hurt. The surprise must have shown on his face, for Naruto's own ire quickly faded away as well. "How does your Kekkei Genkai work?"

~~***~~

Jiraiya watched as Naruto became visibly thrown by the question, and prayed to every deity he could think of that the brat had thought to actually learn about the Kekkei Genkai he had. Surely the boy had enough sense to do that, right?

"As far as we can tell," The blond spoke slowly, clearly choosing his words with care. "It's like I've got medical chakra instead of a normal person's. I can channel it towards an injury, but it's easier if I use my hand to guide it."

 _That_ certainly threw the Sannin for a loop. Medical chakra as a natural chakra polarization? It was unheard of, and the implications of such a thing would send Tsunade reeling. If Naruto's Kekkei Genkai truly worked like that, the brat would single-handedly revolutionize the entire medical community.

"And you can use it to heal anyone, not just yourself?" He must have sounded too eager, for the blond suddenly went on guard, his shoulders set and stubbornness showing on his face in a way that the boy definitely got from his father. Jiraiya sighed, and tried a different tactic. "Did you at least come up with a name for it? You're the first one with this Kekkei Genkai, so discovering all it's secrets, as well as naming it, is your job."

The blond considered it, and Jiraiya was impressed that the teen was finally learning to think before acting, when he responded.

"Shinra Tensei."

_What?_

Immediately, Jiraiya's mind was assaulted by a slew of memories, of a red-haired boy standing in the rain, bearing a unique Kekkei Genkai never before thought to be real; the same boy, sitting next to the Sannin and proclaiming that he would find a way to bring peace no matter what, as a promise to the orange-haired boy laying in the cottage behind them; That same orange-haired boy, now a man, face covered in black piercings and eyes of the red-haired boy, pointing his open palms at the gathering of Shinobi at the Gokage Summit and uttering the name of a jutsu: Shinra Tensei.

"What was that?" He asked, wanting the blond to repeat himself so that the Sannin could be sure he heard right. Naruto muttered something about perverted hermits going senile, but the older man ignored it when the teen faced him again.

"Shinsei Saisei." Naruto spoke slowly, putting emphasis on each individual synonym, while looking at Jiraiya like he was an imbecile. "Divine rebirth. Seemed fitting, given what it does."

This time it was Jiraiya's turn to blink as he wondered just how he could have misinterpreted the one phrase for another. Even though Naruto and Nagato had similar personalities (and upbringings, and potential, and beliefs), there was just too much that made them different for Jiraiya to have mistaken either for the other in his mind.

"Oh." He stalled, trying to save face. "Though you said something else."

"What else could I have said?" Naruto saw the attempt for what it was, it seemed, and Jiraiya was left having to find another topic to start in on. "Shinsei Saisei. Unique enough to be its' own thing, and telling enough that I don't have to explain what it does each time someone asks. Honestly, are you gonna ask me how Kyuubi is next, because I'm not gonna answer a question like that, I'll have you know."

Kyuubi... it struck a chord somewhere in Jiraiya's mind as important, but he couldn't immediately identify why. Sure, it was the source of this new Kekkei Genkai, but that wasn't a problem since it was safely locked away within the–

Jiraiya clapped his hands together, fingers curled and interlocked in-between one another, palms facing themselves. From deep in the pit of his stomach, there suddenly was the inexplicable feeling of something large and alive, yet not entirely tangible, like a mass of chakra that had no definitive form or shape. The writhing non-tangible _thing_ started moving up out of the pit of his stomach, making itself more pronounced and more tangible once it moved into his throat, until he opened his mouth and spat out Gerotora, the scroll toad that held the key to Naruto's former Seal.

"Finally!" The dark orange toad croaked, pointing at the Sannin. "Do you know how long I've waited for you to call me out again?"

"I know." Jiraiya was solemn, his voice as hard and cold as ice. "The Eight Trigrams key – is it still there?"

"That's just it," Gerotora croaked, while Naruto's dark mutterings about how maybe it was a good thing he couldn't summon toads anymore was ignored. "It's gone! Faded away long ago! I've been waiting for you to Summon me about it for years. Years!"

"What?" Jiraiya whirled around, grabbing and yanking Naruto's jacket and shirt up, giving the man full view of the blond teen's stomach. His mind was whirling with contingency plan after plan as he waved a hand glowing with chakra that flickered and wavered like ethereal fire, tendrils of it twirling and writhing along the skin of the blond's torso, bringing forth black lines of Sealing scripture in the shape of a square, with the lines of scripture extending out past the corners and curving to connect with one another – the Steel Dungeon Seal.

"Hey!" Naruto protested, slapping aside Jiraiya's arm and letting both shirt and jacket fall down to cover the rapidly fading seal, although it was pointless at that point; the Sannin had seen all that he had needed to.

"What have you done?" His voice was quiet, the words so soft that he wasn't sure if the blond heard them. Naruto just stared at Jiraiya like the older man was mad, before recognition lit up in the teen's blue eyes, and he began to speak.

"The old seal was flawed. It constantly leaked Kyuubi's Yokai into my Keirakukei." Naruto began, only for Jiraiya to interrupt.

"It wasn't flawed. That's what it was supposed to do – give you an unlimited amount of chakra and an easy way to use Kyuubi's chakra." The Sannin argued, not understanding how that could have meant it was flawed.

"Do you know what chakra poisoning is?" Naruto asked, and Jiraiya scoffed at the absurdity of the question (outside chakra invades host body, becoming parasitic and causing a breakdown of host body along with their Keirakukei with each use the host's chakra), about to call the blond on it when he figured out what the teen was insinuating. "Because that's what was happening to me, and I was going to die because of that Seal."

Except he wasn't, Jiraiya knew, because the steady stream of Yokai, as the teen called it, was to acclimate his body so that it wouldn't poison the blond's chakra, in addition to bolstering his chakra. Everything was wrong – Naruto had a grudge against Konoha (or rather, it's ideals that duty as a Shinobi to your village came above all else), he'd removed and replaced his Seal (one that Minato had given his life to put into place), had his soul promised to the Shinigami because of it, and as a result of his actions, the entire continent was about to go to war. Above all, Naruto had become the child of prophecy; only instead of being humanity's savior, the blond was becoming the harbinger of its' destruction.

"What happened to you?" Jiraiya asked the teen. "You've started a war that could very well end in humanity's destruction and you don't seem to care. Every time someone asks you why you're so angry, you give a different answer. Why don't you just tell the truth? What did we do that you hate so much?"

"You really wanna know what I hate?" Naruto asked rhetorically, his eyes clouded in shadow. "That everyone lied to me – about my family, my status as a Jinchuuriki, I hate that. That everyone in the village thinks that I'm a hero for staying alive. That you think that just because they love me doesn't mean I don't remember a life where no one acted like I existed, where when they did, it was with a hate the cut deep and festered like an open wound. That every single villager and Shinobi is acting like they never did that." Here the blond paused to take several deep, calming breaths. "But I'd be willing to move past that if all of you just owned up to your mistakes – admit that how you handled my status as Jinchuuriki was wrong."

"That's all?" That couldn't be it; if it were, Naruto would have said something to that extent before. Something wasn't right here. Inhaling, the Sannin closed his eyes, appearing as if he were deep in thought to the blond teen, while in truth he was drawing a minute amount of Nature Energy into himself. He didn't need to activate Sage Mode, so Jiraiya didn't have to draw in too much – only enough to extend his sensory perception enough to study Naruto's chakra. If it was agitated or flowing unnaturally, then it signified the presence of a Genjutsu. Jiraiya didn't know of anyone alive that could apply a Genjutsu so subtly, as very few outside of the now-dead Uchiha Clan could manipulate perceptions of reality. Indeed, the capability to apply Genjutsu in such specific ways could only be done by those with a Sharingan eye or similar Doujutsu Kekkei Genkai.

As the Nature Energy settled into his body, Jiraiya flexed his hands, the movement enough to stop the inclusion of Nature Energy into him, and it began to dissipate. In the fleeting seconds that he had, Jiraiya used all of the energy he had taken in to sense everything about Naruto's chakra that he could. All he found, though, was Naruto's chakra calm and as still as it could be, although there was an underlying agitation, an empty chaotic force that almost acted counter to Nature Energy – the Kyuubi, Jiraiya realized, as the sensing ability vanished with the last of the Nature Energy.

"I'll talk with Tsunade, see what we can do." Jiraiya finally answered the teen, intent on relaying everything he'd learned to his old teammate as soon as possible. "Although I wouldn't get my hopes up about being a savior if I were you. With a war like this, the Shinobi need someone to raise morale." The blond tentatively nodded, though he was giving the Sannin a strange look. "Now come here. Time to get back to Konoha."

~~***~~

The sky glowed dark purple in the twilight hours of the day, bathing the world around Naruto in hues of red and blue as the black negative of night approached. All around him, Shinobi were moving, carrying crates filled with katanas, kunais, shuriken, along with dozens of meters of wire and sealing scrolls. They were being loaded onto carriages, which were then sent out to the outer rim, lining up along the wall near the main gate, to be sent out when the Joint Alliance rendezvoused in Kumo in two days.

But none of this was important to Naruto as he wandered the streets, not yet wanting to return to Fu back at Hokage Manor. He was lost in thought, going over what he'd learned while at Mount Myoboku.

His contact with the Shinigami had stained his soul.

His soul was promised to the Shinigami upon his death.

He didn't have a Summoning Contract with the toads anymore (which wasn't necessarily a bad thing, all things considered).

Konoha was willing to forgive him for its misconduct.

That last part was the most most shocking. Naruto hadn't thought that Konoha would want to own up to its' mistakes, instead perpetuating the ideal that he had vanished during transport out of the village, and had since been wandering the Elemental Nations, meeting the other Jinchuuriki and saving them from death at the hands of the Akatsuki. He would be able to deal with the village thinking him a hero (for better or for worse, Naruto _had_ saved his family, in one way or another), but not one based on a lie. Naruto had been lied to enough times over the course of his life; it was time for an era of truths.

But what was the truth, really? There was nothing outside of his word that proved that he wasn't the hero Konoha claimed him to be, nor anything outside of the words of Namikaze's dying soul that Kyuubi's 'attack' of Konoha was anything less than the work of the Biju alone.

"Naruto?" The surprised voice drew Naruto out of his thoughts, and he was left staring at the visage of Iruka-Sensei, who was panting with one hand raised towards the blond teen. The sight of the man who was once a father-figure to the blond brought forth a wellspring of emotions – love, caring, affection that filled the cold emptiness of his heart with a pressing warmth that burned so bright it _hurt_ , guilt, and fear. This was a man who Naruto trusted the most out of all in Konoha, the very first person to acknowledge the blond teen as an actual person and not the shadow of the Biju he held.

Ignoring the rumbles of discontent (clearly Kyuubi was about as happy with that as Naruto was), the blond waved back at the Chunin-Sensei.

"Iruka-Sensei!" The shock and surprise was clear in his voice as the Chunin faltered in his movements, coming to a stop a few feet away from the blond Jinchuuriki. The two of them stood there in silence, both unsure of what to say to the other. Naruto had no idea what to say to the man who was once a father-figure to him, so he just said the first thing that came to mind. "Are you hungry? 'Cause if you are, we can go to Ichiraku, if the stand's still open."

Whatever Iruka had been expecting, it wasn't that, as the Chunin burst out laughing, all the worry and reservations the blond could practically _feel_ coming off of the elder man vanishing with each passing second. Naruto felt himself giggling the more he watched Iruka laugh, and soon he was chuckling along with the Chunin (although he suspected it was more because Iruka had one of those infectious laughs). As the scarred man's laughter died down, however, Naruto suddenly found himself pulled into a hug and held tight.

"I don't know what I was so worried about." The Chunin was saying, his words barely registered by the blond teen, who was shocked by the elder man's actions. "You're obviously still the same old Naruto."

Without even thinking, the blond in question raised his arms, hands turning to grasp the back of Iruka's flak jacket, and he returned the hug given. Naruto blinked rapidly, but he couldn't stop his eyesight from blurring and buried his face in the other man's shoulder, the corners of his mouth upturned the slightest in a bittersweet smile.

Iruka-Sensei hadn't hated him, hadn't condemned him, or idolized him. To Iruka, Naruto was still the little Genin that fought to save the man's life.

"...so much has changed, Iruka-Sensei." Naruto mumbled into the Chunin's flak jacket. "I just don't know what to think anymore."

Iruka said nothing, instead gripping Naruto's shoulders and holding the teen at arm's length. Naruto locked eyes with Iruka, and the older Shinobi's eyes softened.

"Come on," He led the blond away. "Let's talk about this over some ramen. How's that sound?"

Naruto could only let out a short bark of laughter and nodded, following the Chunin along a half-forgotten route, down stone steps and under twisting stone and wood walkways until they found themselves along a familiar dirt road, the street lit up with various vendors using word of mouth to try and sell their products to the passersby. Every once in a while, people would stare and point, but their hushed whispers could barely be heard. In no time they were stepping under the awning and into the warm haze of the Ichiraku Ramen stand, where Naruto was assaulted by a flurry of greetings by the owners of the stand, and ushered into one of the seats while given more praise and a far warmer welcome than he felt he deserved. After ordering (one bowl of miso, as he was going to meet up with Fu afterward and didn't want to ruin his appetite overmuch), Naruto just closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting the familiar smells take him back all those years, to when he was just an Academy student trying to con his Chunin-Sensei out of the man's Hitai-Ate – memories of halcyon days long past.

As the chef started preparing their orders, Naruto started speaking, starting as far back as he knew (his mother, the Jinchuuriki), to the incident at the Valley of the End, to his travels around the Elemental Nations (annotated, of course, because there were certain secrets that should _stay_ secret), to everything and everyone he'd seen and come into contact with upon his return to Konoha. By the time he was done, their orders had been served and eaten. All through it, Iruka just nodded and said nothing, waiting for the teen to finish.

"-and how I don't know what to think! Iruka-Sensei... how were you able to look past your – your hate of Kyuubi and see _me_?" Naruto looked towards Iruka for help, and in response the Chunin merely set down his chopsticks, closed his eyes, and sighed.

"Hate... is a strong emotion." Iruka began. "Not even the hardiest of Shinobi can avoid feeling hate, because they still feel love. Love for their village, their Kage, their comrades, family, friends... love is the basis of hate. When we lose someone we love, we hate – their killers, ourselves, everyone and everything because we could do nothing to stop it. The same can be said for when we're betrayed, like you say you were. Even if you didn't love the betrayer, you still trusted them, and trust is a rare kind of love – most say that trust comes before love, and they're right. Out of trust comes love, and out of love, there is hate."

"But..." Naruto responded, looking confused. "that doesn't explain why everyone hates Kyuubi."

"What you need to understand, Naruto, is that the killer intent unleashed by the Kyuubi that night was beyond anything anyone had ever felt before. There were civilians dropping dead because they felt like they were burning; pregnant women either went into labor or miscarried, and every single child born either that day or in the days preceding died that night – they didn't choke or anything, they just... died. And that was just from its' chakra. All the Shinobi that fought the Kyuubi did so while feeling like their insides were replaced with boiling lava. There were no warning signs, and very few Shinobi felt anything outside of just this gut instinct that something wasn't quite right. The Konoha that you grew up with was not the Konoha that everyone else had grown up with. The losses were unbelievable, and everyone lost someone or something in the attack. That kind of loss bred unimaginable hate. For the longest time, everyone thought that the Yondaime had taken one of the stillborn and gave it new life by Sealing the Kyuubi within it. That's what we thought you were, Naruto." Iruka paused to let it sink in, and Naruto felt the fiery rumblings of Kyuubi at the insult (which was an insult to Naruto, to a lesser extent), but merely nodded his understanding. "But over time you've done things to make people stop associating you with Kyuubi – fought the Demon Zabuza, defended the village against the Ichibi during the invasion, brought back Lady Tsunade for the position of Godaime – there were even rumors of you facing Orochimaru! People had already begun to see you as _you_ when you vanished. When word of the Akatsuki got out, you wouldn't believe the number of people who were worried, and hoped that you were okay."

Naruto couldn't believe it.

 _They... were worried. About_ me _?_

Memories of when he'd beaten Neji during the third phase of the Chunin exams, and the crowd cheering _for Naruto_ crossed his mind, along with the foreign feeling he'd had when he realized that they weren't cheering because it was an entertaining fight, but because it was _Naruto_ that had won.

"For me, I saw a lot of myself in you, when you were in the Academy." Iruka told him, a soft smile crossing his face. "You were a lonely, scared kid that just wanted the recognition and attention of your peers. I was no different when I was your age, and I'd lost my parents." Naruto shifted uncomfortably, because while neither he nor Kyuubi were responsible (and indeed, Kyuubi held no remorse for the loss of life on that night, as he was merely defending himself and his right to be free by the time he had been freed of Madara's control), any mention of it brought about this hollow pit of guilt for having been a part of the events that caused the incident. "And I wasn't the only one to see themselves in you, you know. Hinata was the same."

_What?_

"Hinata?" Naruto stated incredulously. "Hyuga Hinata, the one that hates my guts? _That_ Hinata?"

"She practically idolized you, Naruto." Iruka explained. "You were the reason she pushed herself so far, both then and now. I think... she saw a braver version of herself in you, and because of that, she pushed herself to become that version. After that failed mission, though, when you came back... different... and attacked everyone in sight, physically and verbally, she held out the hope that you were still there, deep down."

Naruto cringed as he remembered the caustic words he had said to her, and avoided Iruka's knowing gaze.

"She felt betrayed by you, and no matter how much she tried, she just couldn't find it in herself to forgive you, so that love turned into hate. She's hated you ever since."

The duo lapsed into silence, the only sounds being the hissing of the oil and water as Naruto contemplated what he'd just been told. He'd been told repeatedly that his hatred of Konoha was childish and that he was better off if he just let it go and moved past it, but Naruto had still held on – because deep down, he didn't want it to be true, even in the face of such immutable facts. He still wanted it to be the Konoha he'd grown up and was taught to believe in. If Hinata was feeling the same thing about Naruto...

He needed to go see her.

Naruto stood up, digging through his pockets to pay for the meal, and set the ryo down on the counter.

"Iruka-Sensei..." Naruto began, his back to the Chunin. "Thank you."

The older man said nothing; he merely nodded and watched the blond teen leave, disappearing into the night.

~~***~~

Naruto stood before the Hyuga mansion, trying to think of something – anything, really – he could say to the heiress to make her see past the hate she held for him, and failing. He was so engrossed in his thoughts that he barely missed being spotted by the cadet branch Hyuga that was moving swiftly to intercept him.

"Halt!" The man, who wore his Hitai-Ate over his forehead and had short, dark brown hair, stepped in front of Naruto, hands held open and facing the blond. Naruto was under no delusions that he wouldn't be recognized, yet the Hyuga's face didn't so much as register any sort of recognition. "What business do you have with Clan Hyuga?"

"I am here to see the heiress, Hinata." Naruto replied, keeping his tone as formal as he could get it (Yagura had taught many lessons on etiquette during their training and travels). "But please do not inform her who the guest is. I would like for it to be a surprise."

It was a gamble, he knew, but it was the only way that Naruto could know that she would see him without being ordered to by Tsunade.

The nameless Hyuga said nothing, and for the longest time Naruto was afraid he would be turned away, until the Hyuga nodded once and beckoned for the blond Jinchuuriki to follow. Naruto was led into the mansion, and came upon a small courtyard that looked like it was used for training. He stopped, and wasn't surprised when the Hyuga stopped as well.

"I think it's best if I waited here for her." Naruto said, coughing lightly. "That last time we saw each other, we weren't on the best of terms."

The Hyuga nodded, and told Naruto to "wait here for Lady Hinata". Naruto nodded assent and just stood in the shadowed light given by the lanterns.

After several hours (although it really must have been several minutes), Hinata appeared, dressed in a loose-fitting kimono meant to be slept in. As soon as she saw who it was, any poise or grace she might have had vanished.

"Uzumaki." She hissed. "What are you doing here?"

"I wanted to apologize." Naruto said, his face impassive. This was something that he couldn't let any outward emotions show. "For what I did all those years ago. I–"

"What you did," Hinata interrupted, moving to circle him like a predator stalking their prey. "was show me – show everyone – who you really are. It is far too late for apologies."

""Hinata, you _know_ that wasn't me." Naruto argued, head turning to keep her in his line of sight as much as possible. "I'm still the same person I was before. Just..."

He trailed off, and Hinata allowed the tiniest of smirks to appear on her face.

"And I am _not_ who I was before. It is best if we stop lying, Uzumaki." Hinata leaned forward, her eyes crowded in shadow as she whispered to him. "You are a monster, and I will do everything I can to expose the truth to everyone."

"Hinata..." Naruto had no idea what to do, what to say. His method of convincing people was better served for battle, and here was a problem where fighting it out would only make things worse. "You are strong. I never once doubted that; not when you stood up to Neji in the preliminaries all those years ago, and certainly not when we met up just before I had to fight your cousin in the arena. Back then, I was worried I wouldn't be able to put up much of a fight against him, but your words gave me the strength and confidence to go out there and beat him. Deep down I know you're still that person, just like I'm still the guy you looked up to and strived to be. What can I do to prove that to you?"

Hinata stopped moving, her expression one of shock before it was replaced with one of cold anger.

"There is nothing that can be done." Her voice was deathly calm, and Naruto felt a phantom chill in the air. She turned and started walking away. "You are not the person I once knew, no matter how much you say you are."

"Hinata, please." Naruto pleaded, moving to stop her. The moment his hand reached out to her, though, she spun around, fingers poised to attack the blond's Tenketsu. He was fast enough to dodge the first strike, jumping back to try and distance himself from her. Hinata, however, lunged forward, moving low along the ground to attack once more, and Naruto found her much too close for comfort and a palm ablaze with chakra moving towards his torso. Without thinking, the index and middle fingers of both hands were extended while the rest of his fingers were curled into his hand, and they were crossed into a plus sign. An explosion of smoke appeared next to Naruto, and out of it came an arm exactly identical to his own, latching onto its' mirror image and pulling the real Naruto out of the way of the strike, leaving the clone open to take the attack instead, vanishing into a haze of chakra smoke that acted like a contrail to Hinata's own attack. "Dammit Hinata! I swore to do the right thing, and I never go back on my word!"

And just as suddenly as they started, the fight stopped, and Hinata stood there staring at Naruto like she'd never seen him before.

"What... did you just say?" Her voice was full of shock, and Naruto became confused at the sudden turn of events.

"I swore to do the right thing." He repeated, watching her carefully. "I never go back on my word. That's–"

"My ninja way." Hinata finished, her voice breathless, and recognition surged in her eyes. "You really are the same as before."

"Yeah..." Naruto had no idea what was going on in her mind, but felt no need to learn – if she was reaching the necessary thing to look past her hate and see _him_ , then Naruto's job was done. "Always has been, always will be. Even if I have changed since then, that part of me hasn't."

"I never go back on my word." Hinata repeated, almost speaking to herself than Naruto. "That is also my ninja way."

Naruto felt the strangest case of deja vu, and felt like he'd heard that declaration before.

 _ **Idiot.**_ Kyuubi chimed in, and the sense of deja vu got worse, until he remembered – that was what Hinata had said when she got back up in her fight against Neji in the Chunin exam preliminaries.

 _Did she make that her ninja way because it was mine?_ Naruto wondered, and the more he thought about it, the more sense it made.

_**I reiterate: idiot.** _

Naruto let Kyuubi's insult slide, figuring that he probably deserved it.

_Love you too, Kyuubi._

"Are you okay?" Naruto asked, tentatively reaching a hand forward, keeping his motion slow and directly in her line of sight. As soon as his hand brushed against her hair, she jerked back, quickly turning away from the blond.

"I am fine." She spoke quickly, and Naruto thought she sounded rushed. "It is late. You should go to your girlfriend; she must be wondering where you are right now."

"Right." Naruto nodded (because it was true; and he _had_ been abducted by Jiraiya the last time she'd seen him), and moved to leave. "I'll... see you around, I guess."

"Yes. Yes, I suppose." Hinata seemed to be nodding to herself, and she sounded almost hysterical. Naruto considered asking her about it, but decided against it – he'd learned more than enough about women while heading to the Land of Iron with Yugito. So he turned and kept going, thinking about when he should go visit the rest of his old friends to make amends. Maybe he could go see Shikamaru, or Kiba, or–

_**Kurama.** _

Naruto stopped walking, the unfamiliar name remaining in his mind until he realized what it meant.

_Kurama?_

_**You have proven yourself worthy. Do not make me regret this decision.** _

And Naruto supposed that Kyu – that Kurama would, and started walking again, a large grin on his face.

 _I won't_.

It was a promise that he wouldn't break, no matter what, because he never went back on his word.

That was his ninja way.


	35. Prelude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> four villages set out to join together, and then...

"I don't like this."

"And you think I do?"

Kankuro snorted, and adjusted the straps on the scroll pack harboring his puppets. Temari glared at him from her position as leader of her respective platoon. Suna had already sent out several platoons of fifty Shinobi running supplies ahead to the rendezvous point, while the majority force would deploy as a single unit before breaking off into several groups so that any enemy encounters would be unable to cripple Suna's forces.

"No, but _look_ at him!" He gestured towards the the two silhouettes in the moonlight, their voices indistinct, but anyone could tell that Gaara and the newly appointed Rokudaime Kazekage were 'discussing' the intricacies involved in the former's Seal. "Something has to be wrong there, for him to be acting so, so..."

"Normal?" Temari supplied with a deadpan look, watching her younger brother flail for words.

"Yes!" Kankuro nodded, and Temari sighed at the almost-desperate vehemency at which he responded.

"Did you ever wonder if this is why Gaara left in the first place?" She asked him, enjoying how he quailed underneath her gaze. "Because you'd act like this if he ever started acting like a normal person?"

"Don't say you aren't as freaked by this as I am, Temari, because I know you are." Kankuro glared at her, and she faltered for the slightest of seconds. "He's _sleeping_ , sis. I know I should be happy, but every time I look at him I see the– the... monster he used to be, and what was drilled into our heads about what to do if he ever fell asleep."

"That's where we're different, then." Temari's voice was clipped. "Because I'm able to find the strength to look past that and see the person he is now."

"I didn't mean it like that." Kankuro argued, but the rest of his argument was cut off as the smaller of the two silhouettes raised her arm, waving it in the air twice before vanishing to reappear at the lead of the final movement out of Suna. The other silhouette vanished as well, reappearing between his two siblings.

"It's time." Gaara intoned, and the silence was shattered to the sound of the footfalls of thousands of Shinobi on the move.

A chill wind flowed across the dunes, pulling the topmost layer of sand along with it. The sand moved with the wind, creating a thin, invisible wall on a collision course with the Suna-nin. It sped along silently, until it froze when the Suna-nin got within five meters of it and were absorbed into several spheres that hovered above the massive group of Shinobi. The waxing moon shone down upon them, bathing the desert in a dead glow that tinted the world blue-black.

Gaara maintained pace with both of his siblings, a wary Kankuro to his left and an impassive Temari to his right. Both behind and before him were hushed murmurs of conversation among the Suna-nin debating all kinds of topics, from concern about friends and comrades to theories involving what will happen during the war. It brought to mind the potentiality of both of his siblings not surviving the coming war. Although he held little in the way of sibling affection towards either of them (as he'd learned by watching Han and Roshi interact with one another), Gaara still felt... uncertain? Guilty?

He didn't know which it truly was, and was quite unwilling to divulge these matter to another (except Naruto, who had long since proven to be an excellent confidant in that regard); all he knew was that there was a strange feeling in his abdomen, right around where his stomach was, that felt like... butterflies (he was sure that was the correct term) were taking residence there.

Perhaps... engaging both sibling in conversation would be more a more fruitful endeavor?

"You are afraid of me." He calmly stated, casting a sideways glance at Kankuro. The man in question stumbled at the suddenness of Gaara's inquiry. "Why?"

"...I'm not afraid." Kankuro replied – rather petulantly, in Gaara's opinion. "Just appropriately wary."

"That does not answer my question." Gaara responded, looking at his elder brother fully. "Why are you afraid of me? I have done nothing threatening, either through action, inaction, or verbally."

"It's not you." Temari spoke up, drawing Gaara's attention. "We're just unused to you being so, so..."

"Well-adjusted?" Gaara supplied blandly. Temari had the decency to look away, while Kankuro nodded his agreement.

"You have to understand, neither of us really knew you before Uncle... died." The tattoo on Gaara's forehead throbbed in remembered pain, and the red-head nearly misstepped at the sudden mention of Yashamaru. Neither Temari nor Kankuro noticed, and the latter continued. "Before... you were just the quiet kid living with Uncle that Father said was our little brother. We hardly ever saw you; I don't know about Temari, but I never took much interest in you when you were growing up. And after..."

Gaara nodded. The less said about that period of time, the better off he was.

He still had trouble relaxing his guard, even after all this time.

"I... recognize the fallacies of my behavior." Gaara admitted, resolutely looking forward. "I do not regret my actions for what they were, but for my behavior towards the two of you... I am truly sorry."

"That's it?" Kankuro growled. "You're sorry to both of us, but don't regret what you did?"

"Our... father," Gaara stumbled over the word, unused to speaking the word without malice. "wanted me dead, and orchestrated the events surrounding my life to ensure the village wanted me dead as well. It was self-preservation, nothing more."

Kankuro remained silent, but from the corner of his eye, Gaara saw his brother's mouth tilt down into a frown as he contemplated the information. It was something that no one ever considered; that a Jinchuuriki's behavior was as much their upbringing and surroundings as it was bleed-off from their resident Biju.

"Gaara–" Whatever Kankuro was about to say was lost as he and the rest of their platoon fell to their knees, gasping for breath as dark spots started to appear in the lower left side of their abdomens, the darkly crimson blood dripping down to stain the sand black beneath the moonlight. Only Gaara was unaffected by the sudden, invisible onslaught, remaining the sole person standing amongst a sea of kneeling, gasping people. His obsidian gourd shuddered as it slowly lost cohesion, the black sand _itching_ against Gaara's skin in its need to respond against an unknown enemy.

"Don't worry," A voice spoke up from atop a mesa in the near distance. Gaara's neck clicked in annoyance as his head twisted, allowing him a clear view at the dull shine of silver hair and glittering purple eyes. "The abdominal cavity wasn't pierced." Hidan twisted the pike in its' place along left side of the abdomen. All around Gaara, dozens of people let out groans of pain, and the medics that had healed themselves were brought back to their knees. "Much."

~~***~~

He was staring at her. Again. Kurotsuchi tried to ignore it. Again.

Ever since that evening in the cave, her uncle Han had been obsessed with spending time with her in some way. Sometimes he asked about her home life; others, he just sat in silence, the type of reserved stoicism Kurotsuchi expected of her brother, Shirotsuchi. To receive it from another... was unsettling, to say the least.

"Kurotsuchi." Her brother greeted her, holding out a backpack – one she recognized as her own. "I don't like this. I should be going onto the battlefield with you."

"You know what Grandfather ordered." She knew the orders as well as he: those that had yet to be proven Chunin rank were to stay within the village, with select Chunin to remain behind for village stability and leadership. Since Shirotsuchi, despite his prodigy status, had yet to be granted the approval of his mentor for promotion to Chunin, he would be staying behind with the other Genin apprentices.

"But I'm one of the most skilled Blast Release users out of the entire Explosion Corps. You _know_ my presence can help in battle. Why Kentaro-Taicho–"

"This is exactly why you haven't been up for promotion, Shiro." Kurotsuchi interrupted, shouldering her pack. She gave a sidelong glance at the silent form of Han, off to the side. "You don't consider the needs of the village, there's only the mission. If you want to be a Chunin, you need to learn to care for the people around you. Chunin are team leaders; how can you be expected to lead a team on a mission if you consider the mission more important that your team?"

Shirotsuchi gave her a slight frown, but said nothing, instead turning and stalking away. Kurotsuchi sighed, watching her brother leave. She knew that Shirotsuchi was impatient, and wanted nothing more than to join the war – he most likely felt that his position was a waste of his abilities, but she knew that her point was valid. He was needed here, back in the village, to protect against the remote possibility of Akatsuki staging an attack against the Hidden Villages at their most vulnerable.

"You handled that well." Han spoke up, his metal suit hissing as he stood up. "Not many would respond with such levelheaded reasoning."

"I suppose you would know about that the best, huh?" Kurotsuchi remarked, heading to join the others at the village entrance. "You had people telling you what you could and couldn't do for as long as you can remember, right?"

"Actually, I was referring to my own attempts to reign in my brother. For lessons on perseverance in the face of those that want to control your every movement, you would be better suited to talk to my brother." Han moved into step beside her, but kept his distance – and rightly so, Kurotsuchi thought, as wisps of steam floated out from between the joints of his metal suit. "You are afraid of me, of what I can do. This is no surprise to me; everyone's always afraid."

"Well, why wouldn't we be?" Kurotsuchi exclaimed. "Your steam corrodes anything it comes into contact with. It isn't a jutsu, and you can't stop yourself from emitting it."

"And I have not felt the touch of another human for over three decades because of it." Han finished, voice resolute as he faced forward. "For just as long I have been afraid of myself. This suit I wear does not always prevent me from harming others. I have to always be vigilant over my every action; for my entire life, I have never been able to do as I wished. No action occurred without thinking it through several times over. Because of it, I have always been levelheaded to Roshi's brash demeanor. I can see many of those traits in you, when you're with your brother."

"Uh, thanks." Kurotsuchi didn't know what to say to that. He waved off her thanks, and they continued in grim silence under the moonlight, approaching the last platoon, they joined Onoki, Roshi and Kitsuchi at the lead. The two of them shared a look as the trio's bickering came into earshot, and they sighed as one.

It was going to be a _long_ journey, but at least they had each other for company.

There was a bright flash of light, a burst of heat, an explosion of sound, and she was lost to the black.

~~***~~

_**Why do you do that?** _

_Do what?_ Utakata asked, humor laced in his thoughts, as he gazed up at the sky – the only direction that the low-laying mist didn't conceal.

 _ **Antagonize Yagura.**_ Rokubi replied. **_It is detrimental to your well-being. I see no use for it._**

The comment was so... _Rokubi_ , that Utakata started laughing. Out loud.

"Self-medicating _again_ , Utakata?" Yagura came up beside him on the deck, leaning against the railing. "I thought we had kicked you of the habit."

"I'm not self-medicating." At Yagura's disbelieving stare, Utakata reiterated. "Seriously. Not self-medicating."

"Then I don't wish to know what is going through that twisted mind of yours that finds a broken arm funny." Yagura responded.

"You overreacted." Utakata's good mood was ruined. "I was joking. You knew I was joking. There was mutual understanding on the joking, so you never needed to hurt me."

"You insulted my love life, and made highly unsavory comments regarding it." Yagura blandly retorted. "If anything, the retaliation was inadequate."

"Breaking my arm was 'inadequate'?" Utakata scoffed, his uninjured arm folding to join the injured in its sling. "Both radius and ulna broken, humerus cracked and dislocated. That wasn't 'adequate'?"

"Would you prefer I make it adequate?" Yagura asked, to which Utakata profusely denied. He might enjoy knocking others off their game, but a masochist he was _not_. _**I beg to differ.**_ "Then do not make light of my personal life. Especially considering that your love life is no better than mine."

Oh, he did _not_ just go there! Utakata seethed, wanting badly to retort, to kick Yagura off of his moral high horse, but... glancing at the arm in his sling, he bit down on the words. While he could have made a 'casual' remark on their respective sex lives, he preferred having both arms uninjured (and there was no assurance that Yagura would stop there; the man had been taught by an Uzumaki – there was no such thing as overkill to anyone who's been in regular contact with one), and it would be an impressive sense of self-preservation – something that Rokubi had been on Utakata's case about for the past six months.

"Truce?" Utakata held out his uninjured hand. It wasn't much of an olive branch, but an olive branch nonetheless.

"That suggests that I aggrieve you as much as you, me." Yagura stated, his tone accusatory.

"A peace offering, then." Utakata rolled his eyes. "I do my best to stop on the grounds that you not injure me, irrelevant of what comments I make. Sometimes levity is required to lessen the tension of the situation."

"Only if there's tension enough to require it." Yagura testily responded, a frown on his lips. "No one appreciates your lack of self-preservation, Utakata."

"I prefer to call it a refined sense of melodrama." Utakata glibly stated into the wind, which had begun to pick up. "Besides, Naruto seems to appreciated it."

"Because Naruto has had to learn from us about the importance of self-preservation." Yagura retorted, his voice raising to be heard against the rising howl of the wind. "There has been no fight he has been in since graduating Konoha's Academy where he has not had to fall back upon Kyuubi's power to gain any sort of upper hand. You know as well as I how great an atrocity the Biju consider such an act."

Utakata did know, which was why he had made it a point to ensure that he would only have to rely upon Rokubi for enemies that would otherwise cause ordinary Shinobi to retreat for safe ground. It was _because_ of Rokubi's presence in his life that Utakata had such an unhealthy amount of sanctity for his own life, and the lives of those around him.

_**If that is to be believed, then why disregard your own safety for such arbitrary actions?** _

_They aren't arbitrary, you giant slug._ Utakata didn't which was worse: getting reamed by Yagura or Rokubi. _Sometimes you gotta disregard your own health to ensure the safety of your comrades._

_**I do not understand. What purpose does ensuring the safety of comrades have towards the sanctity of your well-being?** _

"If I may?" Yagura interjected, butting into their conversation. "But what Utakata's suggesting is an act of selflessness to ensure that neither he nor his comrades will have to endanger themselves in such a way again."

"Yeah!" Utakata agreed, since it was the truth. "If I can do something to ensure that the situation will be avoided in the future for me and my friends and comrades, then I'll do it without a second thought."

_**I still do not fully understand the importance of placing the well-being of others above the well-being of yourself, but it seems I will have no choice but to trust in you until such a time, and perhaps past even that.** _

"Well, how about that." Utakata whistled. "Why Rokubi, I didn't think you were capable of trusting anyone."

_**Saiken, and do not presume that this trust is anything more than what it is.** _

_Saiken?_ Utakata mouthed, confused by the random word, until he grasped the full extent of what had just happened. Saiken, the Rokubi no Namekuji.

"Saiken." Utakata tested the name, aware that he was being watched by not only Saiken, but by Yagura and Isobu. "That's a good name. Well, I hope we can come to a better understanding of each other."

"Names?" The voice came from behind, and Utakata had barely turned around when Yagura had launched a low-level vortex from his hand at the man, who jumped out of the way, only to be sliced by a crescent of air from below.

"Wha–" Utakata barely got out, before the man's appearance sank in. A purple-gray mask with a design reminiscent of old drawings of the Juubi's eye, two tomoe serving as eye-holes while the third sat on the crown of the head, and a black cloak with red cloud designs on it. "Akatsuki."

"Madara." Yagura hissed, his eyes almost glowing in anger.

"If you wish to call me that, then by all means do so." The man conceded, standing as though he had not been affected by the cutting wind attack. "But that is no longer what I call myself."

"And what do you go by now?" Utakata tried to keep the man talking. If this truly was Madara, then the longer they stalled, the higher their chances of escape. Their boat was part of the same one that held Mei and her guard; they would undoubtedly come to prevent Akatsuki from acquiring two of the Biju.

"All in due time." The man cryptically stated. "But you need not be so wary – I am only here to talk; negotiate, if you will, the terms of your surrender."

Yagura charged, both hands ablaze in a whirlwind of chakra.

~~***~~

"So how was your visit to Konoha?" Naruto asked Fu, a light smile playing along the tips of his lips. Fu tilted her head, considered the question, before giving him a slow blink.

"It was... interesting." She responded, tactfully avoiding going into details. "Certainly not what I was expecting."

Naruto nodded at that answer, an almost content look upon his visage as he went back to looking around at the members of the platoon they were traveling with to Kumo in the dead of night. The platoon consisted of none above the rank of Chunin, with the idea being that Akatsuki would mount any potential attacks at the platoon with the Godaime Hokage at the lead, or a platoon lead by several skilled Jonin. It was a dangerous gamble, but was a feint that seemed to be working.

 _ **Oh, you**_ **are** ** _learning, aren't you?_** Chomei snidely commented. _**Perhaps one day I can feel a certain measure of pride when you say you are my host.**_

 _If you felt no pride already, then I would still be ignorant of your name,_ Fu shot back.

_**Was I not complimenting you?** _

_Compliments, I have learned, do not sound so derisive._

_**That is one way to look at it.** _

Fu took a deep breath, leveling her hands just above her chest, and pushed down as she exhaled, finding her center, her connection to the earth below. It was something she often did after conversing with Chomei, and was quickly becoming regular habit. Still, for all that the two clashed, they had long since bonded in their pragmatism and, though Chomei never said as much, Fu's growing sense of self-identity as a human. Humanity had always intrigued Chomei more than anything else – not even the unimaginable skills in fire, water, and earth each of its Jinchuuriki held could compare to the enigma it found within humanity.

She found Chomei's curiosity refreshing, taking grim amusement from each of its' questions concerning human social interactions while still answering them to the best of her ability. It would never do to accidentally alienate the one unchanging constant in her life – Chomei was someone that could very easily make her regret such an action just as easily as she could do the same to it.

"Hey, everything okay?" Naruto asked, concern heavy in his voice. "Chomei's not bothering you again, is he?"

"No more than usual." Fu answered. It was odd, how gender kept being applied to the genderless in the case of the other Jinchuuriki and the Biju. She understood the basic theory behind it, as the Biju came off as entirely too _human_ most of the time, but merely because they possess a wholly unique level of intelligence and sentience did not mean that they should be compared to humans in any capacity, for to do so was to open up the mistaken ideology that they shared human flaws or other characteristics. In point of fact–

The light swish against the air was all the warning before Fu went down, close to the ground. With both hands and feet in direct contact with the earth, Fu didn't have to work quite as hard as usual to 'see' everything around her. What she felt was nothing less than the massive group of Shinobi that stood around her, the thundering staccato of footsteps all familiar enough that she could identify the person behind each of them.

"Dammit." Fu both saw and felt Naruto as he yanked the glistening Senbon from his chest. He swayed on his feet, but held firm in his stance. "Poisoned."

"Bad?" In battle against an unknown foe, the less words spoken between comrades, the better chances they had of not being forced to separate.

"It's healing." _Ah._ So it wasn't too much for his Kekkei Genkai, Shinsei Saisei. "Time?" He was asking for which location to direct the counterattack.

"Unknown." She couldn't get a bead on their opponent, and in a delicate situation such as this, it was better that they not create a panic in the traveling platoon. The enemy could be anywhere, anyone.

A flash of red appeared in the corner of her eye, and Fu turned her head as she moved along the ground, keeping pace with Naruto, only to spot the vibrant crimson hair of one of the Shinobi moving around them. She focused on the footprints, hoping for some sort of revealing news, but the almost wooden staccato footsteps of the platoon–

_Oh._

"Got them." Her voice was low, and carried only far enough for Naruto to hear her. He inclined his head in question, and she could only give him the truth. "Everywhere."

There was a sharp intake of breath, and she knew Naruto had gotten the message.

Whoever this assailant was, they were clearly Akatsuki.

And they had surrounded Naruto and Fu.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for ease of use, the next couple chapters will be of individual battles, and then, the war begins.


	36. Conflagration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Akatsuki attack Iwagakure.

Deidara shivered in anticipation, and began to pat down the pouches at his hips and the pack over his shoulder, taking inventory of the sculptures he had prepared earlier. Again. For the eighth time that hour.

To say he was excited would be a massive understatement. Deidara was elated, experiencing a joyous high that not even Sasori's degrading comments about his art could bring his mood down.

He was to rout the Yonbi and Gobi from Iwa; the intel (as gathered by Tobi, Zetsu's insane contact from back when Deidara was assigned the Rokubi) was that all the Jinchuuriki had appeared in the Land of Iron, and had fought off Leader before returning to their native villages to prepare for war against Akatsuki. He was to bring _both_ of them in (and _damn_ Itachi for dying because Deidara would have loved to rub this order in the bastard's face), with any damage to Iwa or attacks on Iwa-nin to be considered collateral damage – meaning he could do whatever he wanted without Sasori degrading his methods or facing Leader's wrath.

Oh. Hell. Yes.

Which was why he had ensured that both pouches at his hips were full up of clay, and had even gone so far to prepare a few special creations in advance, one of which was sitting in the pack slung over his shoulder.

Deidara was going to _slaughter_ Iwagakure, _and_ screw over the Sandaime Tsuchikage by taking down the man's prize pick for Yondaime. Hell, he might even get the chance to kill old Onoki himself!

The very idea sent shivers of pleasure radiating throughout his body, and made him grin from ear to ear. It was enough that he had started to giggle, and once started, he could not stop, devolving into laughter and then deranged cackles that circled around into giggles once more.

Reaching up to the telescopic aperture affixed over his left eye, Deidara watched with gleeful anticipation as the faint structures of Iwagakure appeared out of the low clouds. It was time. A grinning hand spat out an ivory-colored clay hawk, the tongue almost lovingly caressing the creation as it was laid onto the outstretched fingers, and Deidara took a moment to reflect upon the vessel for his unique art before forming one half of a hand sign with his free hand, gathering chakra enough to animate the creation, enveloping it in chakra-smoke as it expanded to an animate creature large enough to hold his weight. Without a word, he jumped onto the hawk, crouching low as the owl he'd been riding shrank back down and fell into his open hand. The instant his fingers curled around the owl, the hawk's flight began, its' incredible speed turning the world into a blur of blue and brown as Deidara sped towards Iwagakure, towards a confrontation years in the making.

~~***~~

Holding his hand up to his eyes, Roshi watched the cloudless sky like a hawk. Pupils dilated, he tried to see through the cloud cover that hid the stars from view, but to no avail. Beside him stood Kitsuchi, who was staring fixedly at the Yonbi Jinchuuriki while Onoki overlooked the departing platoons some feet away.

"I know what you're thinking," Roshi began. "and I don't have the faintest idea what's going on in that old coot's head."

"Do not insult my father. The Sandaime has his reasons for the decisions he makes." Kitsuchi said, but did not take his eyes off of Roshi.

"Don't I know it." Roshi sighed, taking his gaze down away from the sky. Out of the corner of his eye, lightning flashed and the distant rumble of thunder roiled across the air. "But he is a wily old coot, I'll admit. Usually his plans aren't this confusing, but there are times when he can be a devious genius."

"What I don't get is that he always favored you for Yondaime." Kitsuchi mused, a sly grin marring his face. "It irked me, that favoritism; did you ever know that you're the reason why I'm so skilled with Earth Release Jutsu?"

"...come again?" Roshi blinked, confused at the sudden turn of the conversation.

"It's true. Pa always thought that you were the Iwa's very own diamond mine. Your skill with that Yoken of yours is leagues beyond what your predecessor was able to do."

"Raito Kouga was a hard-headed imbecile." Roshi hotly interrupted. "From the stories I've heard of him, he and Onoki got along pretty darn well."

"Raito Kouga was a hero!" Kitsuchi contested. "He was able to provide the killing blow on the Sandaime Raikage during the war, saving hundreds–"

"Kouga was a drunken menace, and a damn lucky one at that!" Roshi countered, jabbing a finger into Kitsuchi's flack jacket. "The only reason you all look up to him is because he founded the Explosion Corps and created Lava Release; and that was only out of a drunken dare. The idiot was damned lucky not to have died from that attempt."

"And who could possibly exist to tell you those things that you haven't already alienated, huh?" Kitsuchi defended, fists balled up at his side in anger.

"Why, none other than the one who knew him best." Roshi answered. "Son Gokuu."

"And just who is this 'Son Gokuu', if he or she even exists." Kistuchi asked, sure that he'd won the argument.

"You'd know _him_ better by his title: the Yonbi." Roshi replied, oozing confidence.

"What are you talking about, the Yonbi having a name?" Kitsuchi said, disbelief heavy in his voice. "And calling it a 'he'? _It_ is a Biju; a massive construct of heavily condensed malicious energy that barely qualifies as chakra. It has no gender, no independent mind of its own, nor any sort of name outside of the title bestowed upon it."

"That is quite possibly the single most offensive thing I've ever heard anyone say." Roshi shook his head in disbelief.

"Those were your own words to everyone after looking in your mind and meeting it for the first time." Kitsuchi replied. "You were so dead-set on that description of the Biju. What on earth changed you?"

"I–" The rest of Roshi's statement was lost amidst the sudden whistling scream from above, and the resultant explosion carved a crater in the cliff face, sending the duo flying. Roshi skidded along the ground, little clouds of dust flying in the air from the friction that were consumed by the rapidly growing dust cloud. He came to a stop in a crouch several meters away. In the near distance to his right, Kitsuchi was getting to his feet, while further still lay–

_Oh, Kami..._

A pillar of steam rose into the air, and at the base of the column lay a red pile of metal that was instantly recognized as Han. Close by, far too close to the column of corrosive steam for comfort, lay another, smaller form: Kurotsuchi, his niece. Father and uncle locked eyes, an understanding passing between them as they jolted into action, moving towards the prone forms. Off to the side, an object burst out of the dust-cloud, flying up in the air, higher and higher, until it was joined in flight with a larger blur.

The two objects clashed in flight, small explosions dotting the air in the wake of each clash. They eventually leveled out, dozens of meters above the Yonbi Jinchuuriki, revealing the diminutive figure of the Sandaime Tsuchikage staring down a grinning, giggling Deidara, who was crouching atop a bone-white eagle and gazing at the far-off ground below.

"Well, damn." Deidara's murmur was carried across the moonlit night toward the aged Kage. "I missed. Oh, well. All the more fun, I suppose, hmm." He turned to Onoki. "Still, at least that's _one_ down."

"You never did learn to mind your surroundings." Onoki intoned, clapping his hands together. As they separated, a translucent cylinder formed between his palms. With a flicker of thought, the cylinder was pushed out towards the hovering clay bird, rapidly expanding to several dozen times its size, encasing the head and right wing, along with the majority of the right side of Deidara's body. For a brief second nothing happened, Deidara's visible eye widening in shock, before the sphere in the center of the cylinder imploded, taking its contents with it.

A small whoosh of air was heard as the shape vanished, and the remains of the blond Akatsuki member hovered in the air for the briefest of moments before beginning to fall. Onoki allowed a smirk to grace his features when the red-and-white cloak on Deidara's body faded to the same bone-white color as the bird.

"Neither did you!" The snarl came from behind – and below, as the real Deidara dived out of the low-lying clouds, his hands forming a Seal–

The fake Deidara exploded, a plume of fire that rapidly expanded to include the floating Tsuchikage.

"And now for the denouement!" Deidara cackled, clinging to the small bird as it fell to the ground. "I'm coming for you, Roshi! Now we'll find out who's really worthy of being Tsuchikage!"

Dozens of meters below, Roshi had reached his fallen brother, while several feet away Kitsuchi was slinging his daughter over his shoulder. Breathing heavily, Roshi glanced at the man, then to the warring figures high above in the sky, and back to the slowly deepening crater that held his brother. He took a death breath, holding it in as he became covered in a cloak of fire that quickly condensed into what appeared to be magma, and dived into the column of steam.

It hurt; unbelievably so, but with the magma cloak protecting his body he was safe – for now. Without knowing for certain how long this protection would last, Roshi had to move quickly. Without a second thought he scooped Han into his arms and ran out of the crater. With Han's armor broken, there was a trail of steam emanating from the red-covered man. Once they were far enough away from the crater, Roshi set his brother down and stepped back, exhaling and taking another deep breath. Once that was settled, Roshi moved back towards his brother, moving directly towards the mass of pipes jutting out of the apparatus on Han's back. He moved quickly, but with the utmost care, as pipes were reconnected and holes welded shut from the heat of the magma cloak. Once he was sure that the steam had stopped, Roshi was able to safely breathe out, and felt the magma cloak fade as the tension began to fade, and he turned his attention to the sky just in time to see Onoki get caught up in a massive fireball, and have dozens of small little bone-white spheres rain down, popping out into little spider-like creatures that dug themselves into the ground.

"Shit!" Roshi exclaimed, moving to sling his brother over one shoulder once more, zigzagging across the ground as the bombs exploded in a series of crack-pops and earth-shattering booms. Roshi bounced along the ground, coming to a stop several meters away. Setting Han down, Roshi scanned the sky for the originator of the bombs.

"Why dear Roshi, can it be that you're feeling outmatched _already_?" Deidara's voice sang from above. "Why, how can it be that the beloved Tsuchikage-elect is pressured by that one simple, little, bombardment?" He tsked in mock-disappointment. "Surely you'll put up a better battle than that."

Roshi glared, clapping his hands together, barely noticing as the earth beside him shifted, creating a bubble in the flat land that covered Han. Once it had finished forming, without missing a beat, Roshi changed hand signs, inhaling through the nose as he shot out several fireballs from between his lips. They met the newest onslaught of bombs midair, superheating them into combustion. The explosions rang through the air like firecrackers, and from the smoke and flames burst a pair of clay birds, long and thin with four wings, that zigged and zagged around one another as they sped towards the Yonbi Jinchuuriki.

Roshi started running, hands flying from seal to seal as the clay birds followed, flying low along the ground towards their target. High above, Deidara was watching with a gleeful expression from atop a clay owl when a fist slammed into him, attached to a severely angry Onoki.

"Your punches just don't have the same oomph they usually have, old man." Deidara commented, before all the color on him faded, revealing another clay clone. The real Deidara burst out of the owl, smirking. "Maybe you should go back to letting others fight your battles, you senile coot. You've lost your touch."

"Lost my touch, have I?" Onoki said, his free hand forming a seal as the clay Deidara started hardening, becoming purely earthen. Below, there was a flash of magma as a wave of lava overtook the clay birds, melting them into goo. The sudden loss of the clay birds drew Deidara's attention, and his eyes flitted from Onoki's dark expression to the ground below, and in that moment he made a decision.

He jumped, one hand forming the requisite seal needed to explode the clay while his other was being stuffed into the pouch of clay at his hip. What was left of the owl that hadn't been turned to stone exploded, while his free hand spat out a clay bird. An explosion of smoke engulfed the Missing-Nin, and he was propelled away on the wings of a clay eagle. An expression of anger was on his face as he reached into his cloak, pulling out the bag of creations.

"Let's see you survive _this_ , Onoki!" He was kept from following through with his attack when a plume of lava exploded up from below, threatening to engulf both Deidara and the eagle. Deidara had less than a second to react, pulling one of the larger sculptures out, another explosion of smoke, far larger than before, which was then engulfed in an explosion of fire. Propelled by the flames was a massive clay dragon, a long, segmented tail trailing after it.

"Why don't you come down here and fight me face-to-face, coward!" Roshi called from the ground below – with a voice that was far too bored and far too relaxed.

"I know how you fight, Roshi." Deidara called back, a frown on his face at how Roshi had sounded. This was a battle – _the_ decisive battle, the one that would declare which was more befitting of the role of Tsuchikage. "I know how you fight." He repeated, muttering to himself.

One of his hands dived into the back, pulling out several more of his little firecracker spiders, along with one of his target birds. Underneath his feet, the clay dragon rumbled as the tail began to consume itself, several segments being absorbed into the body as the mouth bulged. He palmed the handful of sculptures and flung them out, letting them fly over the side of the dragon and down to the ground; the birds he held back to the count of three, letting them fly towards Roshi as he detonated the spiders.

From the dragons mouth came several thin miniature dragons, specially made for speed and precision. They fell from the mouth and split up, some going towards the dispersing smoke Onoki was sure to be hiding in. He gave the smoke a withering glare.

"Let's see you survive _that_!" He growled, under no illusions about the Sandaime's continued survival. The precision-guided dragons were set to detonate on impact, so that was one problem taken care of.

Deidara turned his attention towards the ground below, where his guided missiles had made contact. He gazed though the telescopic device over his left eye, watching closely for any sign of Roshi's body – alive, of course. Leader needed the Jinchuuriki alive to Seal the Biju, otherwise the tailed beast within would vanish for several years, like with Raito Kouga back during the later days of the Second War. A mutual deathblow traded between the Sandaime Raikage and Kouga had led to the death of both, very similar to the Nidaime Mizu- and Tsuchikage, that resulted in Iwa's temporary loss of the Yonbi for several years.

An explosion rang out off to the side, and the smoke cloud was dispersed by the fire of the explosion, revealing an angry Onoki, a glowing transparent cone alight between his palms.

"I am not amused, brat." Rang through the air as the jutsu was released, sending a beam of pure destructive force in the center of the clay dragon. A hole instantly appeared, one that grew and moved the more power Onoki put into it, until Deidara was forced to leave the dragon behind, falling towards the ground.

"Shit!" Both hands dived into the hip pouches, the mouths consuming as much raw clay as they could hold, before he clapped his hands together. When they were brought apart, a white bubble was spread out between both hands, rapidly expanding until it was larger than its creator. It rippled in the air and warped, becoming more oblong until it hit the ground. The second it made contact, it ballooned out, cushioning the fall for Deidara.

The blond rolled off of the balloon of clay, huffing and gasping. Making such a cushion took more chakra than he wanted to spend, and he would have to rely solely on... solely on...

"Dammit!" He glanced up at the now-destroyed clay dragon, the remnants falling to the ground useless in battle. His bag of pre-made sculptures had been caught up in the blast, reduced to dust in the blast. He exhaled, prepared to use methods and jutsu that he hadn't had to resort to for years. With careful precision, he moved through several hand seals, watching as a clone of himself formed from the earth around him.

Without a word, both he and the clone nodded to one another, moving in different directions. Since Onoki hadn't been incapacitated, he would have to take extra care in escaping with the Jinchuuriki; the old coot was famous for his stubbornness, and would follow anyone to the ends of the earth, so long as there was a clear trail to follow.

"Found you."

The words came from behind, and Deidara had less than a second to react to Roshi's appearance. A torrent of lava rained down on the area he was in, and he was forced on the defensive – _again_. It was just like all those times in the past – Roshi held the offense, giving no quarter, while Deidara struggled to maintain a stalemate, but inevitably going on the defensive.

Deidara went straight for an Earth Release – Doton – jutsu, erecting a wall that separated himself and Roshi. Once that was done, he used another, far easier Doton jutsu to slip beneath the ground, creating some distance between the Yonbi Jinchuuriki and himself. He needed time, enough to make a plan. He knew where the Gobi Jinchuuriki was, all he needed was a way to take down that thrice-damned _Roshi_ , and he could get away clean on a clay bird. Maybe a pelican, perhaps? He'd always wanted to make a coastal bird...

No. Now was the time for battle, not for artistic musing. That comes later, when he was aiding in getting rid of the bodies, and could turn Roshi's damnable form into beautiful art. It was a waste of good art, to be sure, but sometimes such things were necessary; art without sacrifice was not art to be remembered.

He burst out of the ground, vaguely aware that his earth clone had engaged Roshi in battle, and was losing. This was not good. Tearing the burnt cloak off, Deidara fumed at the absurdity of it all. _He_ was the gifted genius, the one apprenticed beneath Onoki – apprentice to the Tsuchikage was a surefire way to becoming Tsuchikage. _He_ was the smart one, the skilled child prodigy, but it was never going to be him.

It never was going to be him.

It was, and had always been, Roshi. Deidara had never factored into the equation.

He was supposed to be winning this battle, not losing. Already he had been forced to use the C2 Dragon, and had lost his C3 Ohako to Onoki's Dust Release – Jinton – along with the rest of his creations. The majority of the clay in his pouches had been used up in creating that rubber ball that had saved his life, along with his chakra. He was losing, something he hadn't calculated, hadn't anticipated.

It was agonizing, losing against Roshi. Losing Onoki's favor, his standing in the village, the future title of Tsuchikage, and now in battle.

No. Not again. Never again. Deidara _would_ win this battle, sanctions decreed by Leader be damned. He could not perform any sort of jutsu capable of rendering Roshi immobile, but alive; almost anything he did at this point would end in his capture, interrogation, and death. He accepted the death, it was an absolute in the world of Shinobi, but he _would not_ suffer the indignity of being captured by his former village, let alone have the captor be the _one_ person he hated most in the world (now that Itachi was dead, of course). He would not allow it.

There was one course of action, at this point. One that went against every sanction Leader had set into place regarding the Jinchuuriki.

The Suicide Art, C0.

It was insanity to even consider it, but at this point, with his loss imminent, insanity was the only way to win. Desperate times, desperate measures.

One hand absentmindedly slipped into the pouch at his hip, the mouth in his palm opening to chew on some of the remaining clay. If he was truly going to go through with this, then he would have to be absolutely sure. He tried not to wince too badly as his palm spat out a mangled attempt at an eagle.

That settled it, then. His skill with Doton was good, but against the likes of Roshi's Lava Release – Yoton – it was almost useless. Without his clay creations, a battle of attrition could never be won.

"Found you." Roshi spoke up from the left, and Deidara brought one hand up to his chest, his shirt balled up in his fist while his other hand fell limp at his side.

"So you did." Deidara's haggard snarl and glare from under his disheveled hair hid the movement of his limp hand into the pouch at his hip, and the shifting of his fingers so the thread Sealing the mouth over his heart closed was included in the fist. "Do you expect Onoki to give you some kind of special promotion? Any Chunin worth their salt could have found me, hmm."

"But not any Chunin, or Jonin for that matter, could capture you alive." Roshi was moving through several hand seals. Deidara's fist clenched tight, and he felt the pull of the thread against his skin, and the rough texture of the clay in his hand. It had to be done in a single, swift movement; it would hurt, by the gods would it hurt, but at least it gave Deidara the satisfaction of knowing that he'd won.

"So you think you're the one who's gonna bring me in, hmm?" Deidara steeled himself. Now was not the time for hesitation, nor could he be afforded the ability to gloat or revel in his transformation into art. "You're gonna enjoy watching while I get interrogated for every piece of information I have on Akatsuki, aren't you." This detonation needed to be quick. He couldn't resist it just to watch Roshi's expression as he realized the futility of running. "Well, think again."

In one move, his tore his shirt off, the thread pulling taut as it was yanked as well, pulling the skin along until it snapped, falling to pieces and letting the mouth burst open. Without waiting a second, Deidara jammed the handful of raw clay up against the mouth, not caring as his fingers were bit into by the sharpened teeth as it hungrily consumed the offering. He could feel it flowing into him, activating every cell in his body and drawing them in, consuming himself and turning every part of himself into pure explosive energy.

"Die!" Deidara's scream was cut short as Roshi slammed two fists into his chest, and he lost all feeling in everything from the neck down. There was no more beating heart, nor any lungs to draw air from. He could not speak, his mouth only moving silently in a mockery of words as his body collapsed in on itself. Deidara could only watch as his plan failed, the detonation process halted by some trick of Roshi's that turned his entire body, barring head, legs, and arms, into lava. He tried to move his arms, tried to stand up, but neither of his appendages made so much as a twitch. He felt a fire-y numbness at the bast of his neck, and the rough feel of the ground against his cheek, but nothing else. There was movement in the corner of his eye, his vision moved to see the silhouette of Roshi standing above him.

 _That was good practice,_ Deidara wanted to say, but the words wouldn't come. And for that matter, why couldn't he stand up?

Was this another one of the Yonbi Jinchuuriki's skills that he loved to show off against the Tsuchikage's apprentice?

There was a shadow of a fist raised above him, and Deidara didn't understand. This was just a practice battle, right? They had them all the time, didn't they?

Why did his neck hurt and his body feel numb?

Then, black nothingness overtook everything.


	37. Negotiation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gaara confronts Hidan a third time.

"You can't win against me." Hidan stated, looking almost remorseful at the downed platoon. He looked directly at the Ichibi Jinchuuriki – or, specifically, the vibrating black gourd of sand at the Jinchuuriki's back. "Especially not with that sand." The Jinchuuriki bristled, most likely feeling insulted at the dismissal of the black sand. "In fact, I think I'll let you have one free shot. If you can beat me using that sand on your back, I'll lift the curse on your village, and we can proceed with the fight as expected."

A lie, but one that the Jinchuuriki would be desperate enough to overlook in the face of emotional bonds. Hidan hummed, tapping the handle of a Kunai against his chin, waiting for the Jinchuuriki to make his move.

He didn't have to wait long, as the gourd exploded into a massive could of sand that rose into the air, invisible against the night sky, the only hint that it existed – and was speedily moving towards Hidan – was the black shadow it cast on the blue-gray desert below. He watched lazily as it moved towards him, and closed his eyes, focusing on the distant thrumming ever-present at the back of his mind for over three years now. With an almost lazy tug, the thrumming floated to the forefront of his mind, morphing into a thundering cacophony, like thousands of drums beating out of tune with one another. The thundering got ever louder still, until Hidan lifted his hand, fingers tilted as if to gently welcome and caress the oncoming sand.

"It truly is stunning, how the almighty Jashin works." Hidan murmured, watching as the ebony sand curled and spiraled, branching off into tendrils that curled and wound their way around his arm and body, just far enough above his skin to set every nerve alight with the chilling warmth it exuded. When it settled in the air around his legs, an always-moving tornado of sand in miniature, he called out to the Jinchuuriki. "It seems, then, that you've lost. Your beloved sand is mine, now."

At his feet, the tornado coalesced into a set of stairs leading towards a platform, and he walked up it, coming to a stop on the platform of ebony sand floating several feet away from the edge of the mesa. He watched with satisfaction the various emotions playing across the Jinchuuriki's face: shock, surprise, a hint of fear, anger.

It was the fear that made this not-killing thing that Leader enforced worth it. The fear that, for all their strength and skill and power, they were still mortal. Still humans, with their pitifully fallible thinking and actions. It was this sort of enlightenment that had made the process of becoming an acolyte of Jashin bearable; Hidan was now fully aware of his placement in the greater universe, and was now a wholly spiritual being existing within this physical body for a single purpose – to ensure that as many souls were introduced to the enlightenment Jashin provided as he could, for as long as this body of his held out.

"What have you done?!" The Jinchuuriki's shock was clear in his voice, and Hidan merely chuckled at the uninitiated child.

"Do you remember the curse I inflicted upon you all those years ago?" Hidan called down, the sand platform beginning to move towards the Jinchuuriki. "And how it drew the souls of those whose blood stained this sand of yours?" All around him, the excess ebony sand floated, orbiting him like a Shinobi squad protects their client. "Did you really think that slaying those souls would end the curse inflicted on this sand?"

The Jinchuuriki gaped, while from behind him a pair of figures flew into the air, their joints clacking as they moved. There was a faint shine in the air, like dew-covered spiderwebs, that Hidan's eyes traced from the flying figures to the hunched-over figure of the newest Kazekage.

"Your puppets won't stop me, Kazekage." Hidan said, flicking the Kunai in his hand across the back of his left wrist, feeling as the skin parted and the tendons were cut. Below, the long-haired puppet froze, going limp as it started falling to the ground. It didn't fall more than ten feet before it jerked, and started flying towards him once more. With a sigh, he absentmindedly jerked the injured hand towards the oncoming puppets. The ebony sand followed his movement, dispersing in the air to flow into and around the puppets. There was a grinding noise, and even though they were still approaching, the joints were locked in place. They continued on their path for several feet before stopping several meters below Hidan.

"Why do you need the Jinchuuriki?" The elderly Kazekage called out, her voice surprisingly strong. "What purpose does a group of A-class and S-class Missing-Nin want with them?"

"I don't believe that you're in a position to be asking questions, Kazekage." Hidan called back, twirling the Kunai between his fingers. "But... don't think that I'm not beyond negotiating a deal."

"Sunagakure does not negotiate with rogue elements!" The Kazekage retorted.

Hidan clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. "See, that's where you're wrong. But this is also where you can take advantage of a wonderful opportunity."

"Opportunity?" He heard the Jinchuuriki repeat, and let the grin come across his face as he responded.

"Yes, opportunity. You see, I follow the teachings of the almighty Jashin, and one of the edicts is that death is mandatory to those whom are cursed by an acolyte must die. Now, the good news here is that there has not, technically, been a curse placed all of you Suna-nin. This means that, should we come to blows, I can very easily end this curse. However, to do so means that I would have to place my curse on one of you." Hidan calmly explained. "Now, this is where the problem lies. You don't want me to place my curse on you, and I cannot place my curse on the Ichibi Jinchuuriki. So, here is my proposition. You be a good, cooperative Hidden Village and give me that one, lonely little Jinchuuriki you have there, and I won't have to kill all of you. This deal is more than fair to you. In fact, you could easily say that this solution is to your benefit. By willingly handing over your Jinchuuriki, the Land of Wind will be free from participating in this war you've declared. Indeed, none of your Shinobi will have to sacrifice their lives for a futile cause. So how about it; surrender a single Jinchuuriki, and save countless thousands from meaningless death as a consequence of this war. What do you say? Do we have a deal?"

~~***~~

Gaara stared in horror as _his_ sand – the sand that he had personally had control of for longer than he could ever remember, that had acted as comfort when no one else offered any – responded to this monster instead of him. It was horrifying; he could still feel it, could know exactly where each and every grain was and how they moved and shifted, but at the same time any action he wanted them to go – dispersal and entombment of the Akatsuki member – was ignored. He felt violated, like a piece of his soul was being molested and he could do nothing to stop it.

"I'm sorry lad." Chiyo spoke up from beside him, holding her injured left arm close, pressing it up against the gash in her torso. "He makes a tempting offer, and does hold the advantage should we choose to decline."

"You can't!" Kankuro hissed, crouching nearby with Temari. "This is _Akatsuki_ you're going to barter with. Missing-Nin top the list of people not to negotiate deals with, and that organization is full of them. You can't possibly trust his word!"

"Don't be absurd!" Chiyo scoffed, glancing at the younger puppeteer out of the corner of her eye. "If I didn't know better, I'd say _you_ were the senile one, boy!"

"You have a plan." Gaara didn't phrase it as a question, but fact. Chiyo inclined her head.

"Curses are Seals, and in the end, all Seals can be undone." Her head tilted towards the red-headed Jinchuuriki. "Your control over that special sand of yours is gone, but you can still control the desert, right?"

Gaara nodded, understanding flitting through his eyes as he realized what she was planning. It was a dangerous gamble, but here in the desert, with sand surrounding them for kilometers around, he was certain in his safety. A sharp nod passed between Kazekage and Jinchuuriki.

"We accept your terms!" Chiyo called out to Hidan, who frowned at the response.

"Send the Jinchuuriki out!" Hidan replied. "Alone! Anyone does anything to screw this deal, this Kunai gets a one-way ticket to the aorta, with stops at the superior and inferior venae cavae."

"Do as he says." Chiyo calmly told the red-head, a glare silencing Gaara's siblings. Gaara glanced back at his brother and sister (biologically, at least; Naruto and Fu had taken such spots in his heart long ago), who were watching him worriedly. While their sibling relationship was in tatters, it was slowly mending into something resembling friendship.

"Don't worry." Gaara felt himself saying, a platitude that felt more like a promise, the kind that Naruto always made – which meant that no matter what happened, things would be alright. "I will return."

"Gaara..." Temari began, but trailed off as he turned, walking steadfastly towards the deranged Akatsuki member. The desert sand crunched beneath his feet as he walked. Gaara drew a deep breath, reaching deep within himself, going towards the pained, angry screams of Shukaku. With that came a surge of Yokai, and a feeling of being, like Gaara was innately aware of every grain of sand for miles around. It was at the cusp of this ocean of Yokai that Gaara stood, letting the feel of the desert engulf him. With a flicker of thought, he made the sand at the feet of his siblings shift, forming words – instructions to be followed and relayed to all in the platoon.

No sooner had he sent the message was the triple-bladed scythe flying towards him, and he was forced to dodge.

Only, the rebellious black sand was curling around Gaara, holding him in place as the scythe moved ever closer. With methods of retreat and dodging prevented, he was left helpless when the outermost blade made contact strafed his chest, gathering a thin trail of blood along the edge. As the ebony sand let him go, Gaara pressed both hands to the slice in his shirt, over his heart. While the desert sand below flows in tiny rivulets along his skin from his feet to his hands, stitching together and numbing the pain as best the miniscule grains could, the screaming protestations of _his_ ebony sand at being used against him echoed within his very soul.

The scythe finished its arc, curving through the air and returning to its owner. The sand platform shifted, and Gaara didn't need to see to know that it was forming the strange symbol – a triangle within a circle – that was synonymous with this mysterious cult of Jashin. The blade harboring Gaara's blood was lifted up to Hidan's mouth, and a tongue slipped out, sliding across the bloodied blade, collecting the crimson liquid with fervor. Once the blade was clean, the tongue retracted, back to hiding in the orifice it came from.

"This is almost too easy." The silver-haired Akatsuki member shivered in delight as his skin became blacker than night, with almost glowing white pictures of bones appeared over his body. Once the color stopped fading from his body, Hidan took the Kunai in his hand, slowly dragging it along his cheeks. With a quick flick, a long, thin cut was created on one cheek, going from cheekbone to chin. Gaara felt a sudden blossoming of pain on his cheek – the same one that Hidan had injured himself on – and a hand flew to his face, fingertips gently dabbing at the cut that was there. Behind him, there was a collective gasp from the platoon, and he turned his head, watching behind him as the entire Suna platoon found themselves devoid of a similar injury. "On behalf of Akatsuki, I thank you for your consideration." Hidan outstretched his hand and, with a flick of the wrist, the black sand was curling around and encasing Gaara's hands, compacting tight enough that movement quickly became impossible. The outstretched hand upturned, and the ebony sand curled around and ensnared Gaara's feet as well, and he was lifted into the air. "I shall now take my leave in peace. Anyone tries to stop me, and..."

The threat was left unsaid, and everyone understood. Gaara was a hostage, much like they had just been, and any attempt to stop the silver-haired Akatsuki member would only end up hurting the Ichibi Jinchuuriki. Gaara continued to rise in the air, until he was facing across from Hidan.

"Are you afraid of death?" It was a taunt, Gaara knew, and one whose bait he would not indulge.

"This sand has been mired in the lifeblood of dozens." Gaara knew that Hidan was listening with interest, even as he was turning away to begin the move towards Akatsuki's base. "For many years, I believed that it was imbued with the spirit of my mother, and chose to believe that the screams of Shukaku was her spirit trying to contact me."

"Your mother's spirit..." Hidan hummed, scratching his chin with his nails. A phantom sensation came across Gaara's upper throat, just beneath the chin, of claws digging at the skin. It distracted from the jarring movement that came when the ebony sand jerked into motion. "That explains many things about this sand. Not idly does one of Jashin's curses ensnare an inanimate object. Your mother must truly have loved you, to imbue her soul into this sand."

Green eyes widened, and Gaara was soon looking at the sand encasing his limbs with intensity he'd not before had. His mother's soul – had been there all along? Through all the blood and death, she had been there, protecting him from beyond the grave?

Yashamaru had been wrong in his words, all those years ago?

"You didn't know?" Gaara's attention flew back to Hidan, and green eyes met glowing purple. "Well, how about that..." The deranged man seemed to trail off, his eyes watching the waxing moon with interest. "I could tell you."

Gaara blinked, confused at the abrupt change in subject. "Tell me what?"

"What she's saying." Hidan gave Gaara a look of absolute condescension, meanwhile pulling out a roll of gauze and wrapping it around his injured wrist. "Oh, don't give me that look. I am blessed by Jashin. This body is little more than a tool to house my existence; I have long since achieved enlightenment transcending this mortal plane, and can perceive things beyond your comprehension. So!" He clapped his hands together, a hungry grin on his face. "Shall we get this séance started?"

"You... wish to help me?" While many conceptions about encountering enemy Shinobi had been turned on their head because of life with Naruto, Gaara was completely speechless at this almost uncharacteristic behavior from the psychopath.

"Oh, no; I still want to curse you into death and beyond." And here Hidan's grin slid away, only to return far more ravenous and malevolent. "But making you suffer instead of dealing the killing blow will have to do. After all, I shan't have use of your body after your death, and having Sasori turn you into one of his puppets just won't satisfy like a living, breathing person would."

That... had to be the single most disturbing sentence Gaara had ever heard. And he'd lived with Naruto for the past three years.

"You derive pleasure from the death of your victims." It was a statement of fact; one that Gaara would hold by until the end of his life if anyone asked about the madman before him. "Their deaths give you pleasure unlike any other."

"Nothing so physical, you uncultured philistine. All pleasure I receive is purely of the soul. I took a vow of abstinence when I converted to the Church of Jashin." If anything, the psychopath looked disgusted at the idea of such a thing (which just put this experience down as the single most disturbing thing to happen to Gaara in his entire life). "I'd ask if you wanted to convert, but that wouldn't be good for Leader's plans."

"What are those plans?" Gaara figured that the man would spill everything out of hubris. Instead, Hidan just gave the red-head a maddeningly leering grin.

"That would be telling, now wouldn't it?" The Missing-Nin's head tilted, and purple eyes shone bright under the light of the moon. When placed against the backdrop of the skeletal visage, Gaara was stricken with the sudden likeness between Hidan and old paintings depicting hell-gods. Perhaps belief in Jashin was created out of fear to those very same gods... "You never gave me an answer."

"An answer?"

"The spirit of your... mother, was it?" Glittering purple eyes hidden within black pits leaned in close, almost eclipsing Gaara's vision. He tapped the ebony sand entrapping the red-head's hands. "Can you _imagine_ the words she must want to say? How she feels about being responsible for all the blood staining your hands?" Suddenly, the eyes pulled back to reveal a grin stretching from ear to ear. "Really puts the fear of god in you, doesn't it?"

Gaara didn't say anything, instead focusing on the cascade of desert sand building up in the air behind Hidan. He already knew about this curse from Yugito's tale of her encounter, along with how to stop it – remove the caster from the sanctioned area, and the curse would not take effect.

Without a response, Hidan was getting impatient, and the grin twisted into a frown, before morphing into a grimace of rage.

"Hey. Pay attention when your betters are–" Whatever he'd been about to say was lost to the winds when the deluge of desert sand attacked, wasting no time in surrounding the Missing-Nin, and Gaara allowed a smirk to grace his features at the madman's lack of situational awareness – only for the orb of desert sand to explode open in a deluge of brown and black, revealing an irate Hidan, glaring at the Jinchuuriki. "You are trying my patience, Jinchuuriki."

"Good." Gaara jerked his head, and another deluge of sand surged from below, exploding into a massive wall that separated either from the other's view. Tendrils slid from the wall, joining the tiny rivulets running to his bound hands and feet, causing an explosion of sand that freed him from his bonds.

" _Enough!_ " The snarl came from above, and Gaara saw Hidan standing atop a platform of ebony sand, his silver hair disheveled, strands dangling over his furious face. "You _will_ come quietly, or I will be forced to use more... drastic measures."

To ensure his point really sunk in, Hidan took out one of his pikes and stabbed it deep into his leg, straight through to the other side. Gaara gasped as his own leg collapsed, a blotch of red dotting his leg just above his knee, staining his pants leg as the bleeding spread..

"Don't worry. It's not as bad as it looks. The bleeding will stop soon enough, but you won't have to worry about bleeding out from lack of treatment." Hidan's voice was disturbingly calm, but there was an instability to it, an insanity that Gaara could almost feel. "Do _not_ assume I won't land a killing blow the first chance I get." At Gaara's shocked expression the beginning of a smile danced at the edges of Hidan's lips. "Do you understand now, the pain we cause one another?" The pike was yanked out, and Hidan wiped the blood off using his cloak before dragging the tip along his arm. "The soul-deep agony that cannot be denied? This is the kind of pain that will drag you down to the worst pits of Hell without proper understanding and atonement for your sins." The pike was pulled away, retracted and returned to its spot within the folds of the cloak. Both hands came together in a flurry of seals, before clapping together. "Now, feel the pain that your mother's soul feels."

The ebony sand exploded, flying through the air towards Gaara. A dark haze could be seen against the moonlight, ephemeral wisps of smoke that flickered and curled around the ebony sand, making it appear as if it were wreathed in dark fire. The deluge of desert sand moved to intercept, but the unfamiliarity Gaara had with it made the reaction time a fraction of a second too slow, and soon he was being smothered by the ebony sand, the ephemeral fire burning deeper than skin, setting fire to his veins and spreading to encompass his entire being.

The black fire was a numbing burn, an agony that penetrated deep, deeper than bone, and created a pain that felt far worse than anything physical. Not even Shukaku's screams at its worst was this painful, seeming like a small irritant in the face of this soul-deep agony that _burned_. Gaara heard screams, so loud and pained that they could not possibly have come from anything even resembling human, but a small, deadened part of him recognized those screams as his own. He didn't think it possible for a human to make such guttural, _raw_ sounds; was this what dying felt like?

" _Gaara..._ "

And then, the burning fire stopped. Gaara cracked one eye open, careful not to agitate his far-too-raw nerves with too much stimuli. White light shown out from all sides, bright enough to reveal the endless expanse, but not so bright that it hurt to look at it.

" _Gaara... I'm so sorry..._ "

There it was again; a voice, one so familiar yet foreign that it made his heart ache with wounds he never new existed.

"Who..." He tried to speak, but it came out in a dry rasp that hurt to make. Still, he tried again. Finding out who the owner of this agonizingly familiar voice was sounded like the single most important mission he would ever embark upon. "Who are you?"

" _I'm so sorry..._ " The feminine voice sounded closer, and was less of an echo than it had been previously. " _I wanted this to be an honor... something you could be proud of... I never knew your father would..._ "

"Who are you?!" Gaara turned around, eyes wide open as he searched for the figure the voice belonged to.

" _I can't... just remember that I will always love you, no matter what you do..._ " She can't? What can't she do?

"Please, tell me who you are!" Gaara's vision blurred as the sting of tears bled into his eyes, the salty liquid overflowing and trailing down his face. He didn't quite understand why she was making him cry, but whoever she was, he recognized her voice – just not the person behind it. Why couldn't he remember?

" _My name... Karura..._ "

Time stopped.

Karura? His mother? His _real_ mother, not some _thing_ masquerading as her? Was he– could she really be–

"Mother?" The word, despite having been regularly used in his earlier years as a way to deny the reality of the eternal whisper at the edges of his mind as coming from the murderous Shukaku, weighed heavily on his tongue. It felt... foreign, filled with raw _want_ and desperate _need_.

" _I am so, so sorry... your father... he only wanted the best for you... he lost sight of what was truly important..._ " She sounded so regretful, and it picked at wounds he never even knew he had. They were wounds of the heart, Gaara realized, and could only be healed with one thing.

"Have you come to give me medicine?" There was a bubble of laughter that was too-soon choked by a sob.

" _You've already gotten it... I gave it to you the very first moment I saw you..._ " It stung, and he felt a different sort of pain, one that dug deep and prodded at nerves and emotions that he'd never thought existed within him.

It was the feeling of being loved.

"Thank you." The words came out in a choked sob, and he was left slumped on his knees, quietly sobs echoing in the white expanse. "I... thank you."

Gaara didn't think he could handle giving this sort of medicine, not if _receiving_ it turned him into such an emotional mess.

" _It's love... you don't need to thank me..._ " Oh, how he wished she was really, truly here. How he wanted to hold her close, to feel her touch and listen as she whispered words of comfort. " _I don't blame you for what you did... I am proud of you, my son... and know that I will love you forever..._ " Something was different now; her voice sounded like it was fading away. " _I wish we had more time... I'm so sorry... tell your brother and sister I love them... I love you, Gaara..._ "

And then she was gone, leaving Gaara alone in the world, his mother's love pulsating within.

He had been told once that the sand that followed him around was a symbol of his mother's love for him, a dying wish to protect him from harm. And so she had, preventing even the most minor of injuries to happen to him over the years. Now... now he was to stand on his own power, to step out of her protecting shadow and into her loving acceptance of his own power. It was time now for him to survive without her protection.

When next Gaara opened his eyes, there was no pain. He was wrapped in darkness, but it was comforting. Familiar. All around him, sand was falling away, dropping down into the desert below, revealing a calm expression to to the silver-haired Missing-Nin.

"What... what are you?!" The man was hysterical, the triple-bladed scythe in his hands and at the ready. With a snarl, the falling sand – no longer ebony, but now returned to the previous earthen brown color from years ago – coalesced into a singular arm that reached out, moving to grab at Hidan – only for the Missing-Nin to bounce out of the way, falling to the ground and jumping out of the way of whatever arms of sand reached out to grab at him. He brought the scythe down on one of the columns of sand, the blades stabbing deep within, only for it to get stuck. Without missing a beat, Hidan jumped off the handle, flying away and towards a lone rock outcropping.

Blackened fingers slid around the cable connected to the end of the scythe, yanking the blades free and sending the scythe flying back towards its owner. The Missing-Nin grabbed it out of the air by its blades, the sharpened edges digging into his skin – but he paid little attention to it, instead gripping the handle in his other hand and dragging the lowest blade against his palm, slicing it open. In the moonlight, the blood appeared both a deep, rich reddish color and a deep, empty black as it dripped down onto the rock. Wasting no time, Hidan stepped in the puddle, using the heel of his sandal to create a circle of blood, and then forming a triangle within, the edges touching against the inner lining of the blood circle. The moment the sigil was completed, the scythe's blades were brought up against the Akatsuki's member's neck. Immediately the onslaught froze, pillars of sand that were hanging in the air began to fall apart, thin rivulets soon becoming thick waterfalls that fell and joined with the dunes below.

"That's right," Hidan snarled, a feral grin on his face as ragged breathing seethed through clenched teeth. "You can't hurt me while I have this curse in place. Now, you are coming _quietly_ if this is the last thing I ever do!"

A sphere of wind, the size of a man's head, came barreling though the air, slamming into Hidan's midsection. The sudden attack threw the man off, upending his balance and nearly sending the Missing-Nin flying backwards. Gaara grunted, the phantom pain of the hit affecting him just as much as it was the Akatsuki member. In the moonlight, there was a faint blue shimmer against the air, like spiderwebs waving in the wind, and the scythe was yanked from the Missing-Nin's hand, before a clacking wooden creature – one of Kankuro's puppets, Gaara belatedly realized – opened its' chest, enveloping the off-balance Hidan and pulling away from the cursed symbol.

"Got him!" Gaara didn't need to look to see that his siblings were there, executing the plan. With the an captured, now they could–

Pain shook through the red-headed Jinchuuriki, and he was down, falling from the sand platform to the desert below. Reaching up with one hand, the desert moved, flying up to meet him and slow his descent, while his other hand pressed against his side, to the slowly growing red splotch that was seeping through his shirt and under-armor. Blood, so dark in the night it was almost black, dripped from between his fingers, and his breathing felt wet and ragged.

"Bind him!" The words were screamed, though whether they were from his mouth or not was unknown, because all that his world was, was sideways and tumbling down a slope of sand as he tried not to jostle his injured side or leg any more than necessary. Eventually Gaara stopped, and he was left with a sideways view as Kankuro was flicking chakra strings left and right, while Temari rushed towards the injured Jinchuuriki.

"The symbol!" And this time he _knew_ the words spoken were his own, just as he realized what had happened. "In the puppet! Get it away from him!" A thought came to him, and he reached out to grab at Temari. " _Don't_ injure him. His curse is in effect."

She nodded, and turned to join her other brother, who was off to the side, standing near his puppet. Hidan's screams could be heard coming from within the bloated belly.

"Do you think you can stop me? Huh?" There was a faint noise, a _chok_ sound, which was faintly recognized as a blade chopping at wood. "This will never end, do you hear me?"

Gaara snarled, a faintly weak sound that lost itself to the hiss of pain it became. His leg and chest were still hurt, and would have to be looked at by one of the medics, but Gaara could still fight; physical movement had never been integral to his fighting style.

"Open it." Gaara slid into something resembling standing, with a pillar of sand molding into a dull-brown duplicate of the red-head underneath one arm. Temari hesitated in her motions, and she looked back at him like he was crazy.

"Are you crazy?" Kankuro's hands were a blur in the air as he tried to find a way to immobilize the captured Missing-Nin without injuring him.

"That is a debate for another time." He turned to Temari. "Distance yourself. It's better that I alone end this battle."

"But–"

Gaara silenced her with a glare. "Do _not_ take away my kill. His death is one I've wanted for many years."

Kankuro looked like he wanted to protest, but upon meeting his brother's eyes, he nodded, displeasure heavy on his face. Temari also looked like she wanted to protest, but nodded in agreement anyway. The two siblings shared a look, and then they leaped away, distancing themselves from the battle to come. Along with the puppeteer flew the puppet, its' chest now wide open and empty.

"Big mistake!" Hidan's cry came from behind, and Gaara didn't need to even move to know that the sand was already reacting, flying up into a wall between the madman's scythe and the Jinchuuriki. For the briefest of seconds both opponents were frozen in time, before the wall collapsed outward, flying towards Hidan to immobilize him, only to grasp air. "Don't think that little trick of yours will work!"

Gaara coughed, his breathing labored, and felt warmth and the taste of metal in his mouth as blood began to fill his mouth, spilling out over his lips and into his hand. This battle could go on forever, but his injuries meant that he couldn't prolong its end.

"Don't think this is all I can do!" Gaara snarled, flinging one arm out to direct the sand. With a physical act to accompany the thought-command, the sand moved faster, and all-too-soon the Missing-Nin's arms and legs were bound, with more sand slithering up to completely encase the silver-haired man. "I've learned from our previous encounters."

"Have you?" Hidan smirked that damnable smirk before sucking in a breath and dislocating one of his shoulders. Gaara watched in shock as his own shoulder was dislocated, and it was all he could do not the scream and crush the Missing-Nin into dust right then and there.

"How?!"

"I've risen above such physical limitations that you Shinobi seem to have." Hidan's tone was like one would use to scold a child. "The symbol does have to be physical for the curse to take effect, nor do I need a weapon or freedom of movement to share this pain with you. You will never win."

Gaara snarled, a guttural sound that held the threat of the Biju held within. His eyes flashed a bright golden yellow, the irides a four-pointed star with tiny black dots in the space between the points. At the same time, the entire desert began to roil, churning with life as the sand started to form into a massive shape full of claws and teeth and sharp, jagged points. "I beg to differ."

The replica of Shukaku surged upwards, maw agape and filled with a tongue of sand the promised pain and agony. Hidan barely had any time to react as his entire body was engulfed within. The giant beast shook it's head like a wet dog would in the moments before it shook the rest of its' body dry, and only when Gaara was well and truly convinced that the Missing-Nin could no longer tell which was was up and which was down did he regain control, locking Shukaku back down to the depths of his mind he had banished it.

As the sand broke down, Gaara made sure to keep just enough covering the silver-haired man so he wouldn't be able to have any sort of reference point to spiritually imprint the sigil of that thrice-damned Jashin upon. With a flicker of a thought, Gaara's eyes went to his now-injured arm, and he watched carefully for any sign of injury, only to see it remain as unblemished as ever. _Good..._

"The time is long overdue for your death." Gaara coughed some more, and more blood filled his mouth. This would have to be quick; he lifted his uninjured arm away from the wound on his chest, and outstretched his hand towards the lump of sand floating in the air that held the Missing-Nin. "You were an excellent kill."

His hand clenched into a fist. The sand lump compressed in on itself, and a faint _squelch-crack_ was heard, along with several smaller, less noticeable cracking noises. With a sigh of relief, Gaara waved for whichever of his siblings had remained close enough to watch the outcome to approach, and watched with satisfaction as the sand fell to rejoin with the dunes below, glistening under the moonlight with the stains of blood.

It was over.

He barely noticed as Temari returned, nor did he take much notice of the medic she'd brought with her. It was only until he was being helped back to the platoon (and to Chiyo for any information he might have gleaned on Akatsuki from the battle) that he finally spoke up.

"Temari," he began, unsure where to start. "What did... what did mother sound like?"

Because it couldn't have been her. Not possible.

Even though there was that small part of him, deep down, that really wanted it to be her. To get a message of love like Naruto did from his own.

"What did she sound like?" Temari seemed to muse on the question before she muttered to herself that of course he wouldn't know. "Well, she sounded... comforting. You knew, once you heard her voice, that everything was safe, and would be alright."

"Like..." Gaara searched for the right words; it would not do to say the wrong thing and have her misunderstand. "Like a presence in your heart that... was always meant to be there, protecting you from wounds of the heart?"

Temari looked at him sidelong, a million and one thoughts and emotions apparent in her eyes. "...yeah, just like that."

Gaara said nothing, for there was nothing more to say.

"She was so thrilled when she told me and Kankuro that you were coming." Temari's voice broke through the silence, and Gaara found himself studying the few clouds that could be seen in against the light of the almost-full moon. "She made the two of us promise to be the best big sister and big brother ever."

He wanted her to stop talking, because at this point it was undeniable that the voice _was_ her, and he didn't want to break down here, in front of people that had no right to see him at his most vulnerable.

"Thank you." He pulled away as much as he could, given the circumstances. "I should go consult with Chiyo the next course of action when we reach the rendezvous point."

It was her.

His name had really been given out of love.

His mother really, truly _loved Gaara._


	38. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A tense reunion between enemies.

"I seem to be getting mixed signals." The masked man – Madara, not-Madara – sounded bored, and was watching from his position on the railing with mild interest. In the shadow of the moon, the eye-holes of his mask glowed from the power held within. The right eye glowed blood-red from the Sharingan, while the left eye held the muted gray glow of a Rinnegan. "Perhaps you could enlighten me, Rokubi Jinchuuriki."

Across from the man stood Yagura, panting heavily while wielding his hook-staff, while further back Utakata was crouched on the far end of the deck. Between the two combatants, there was a massive tear in the ship, cutting a crescent moon shape that marked where the masked man had previously been standing.

"If you're not Madara, then who are you?" Yagura growled, his voice a deep rumble, accented by the Sanbi held within. "That is, _if_ you speak the truth."

"I would never speak lies." The masked man replied jovially. "I prefer to allow the truth to rout the lies. You see, truth is far greater a weapon to be used than lies. Wouldn't you agree, Tadashii?"

With a growl, Yagura leapt forward, intent on attacking once more, with the masked man watching with badly veiled amusement, only for a bubble to pass in front of the former Mizukage's face, exploding in his face and stopping him in his tracks.

"That's enough!" Utakata didn't do authority; when he did, Things happened – capitalization intended. It was why his best method of teaching had been through example, because that meant that he wasn't taking authority over his latest nutjob apprentice, and could easily deny responsibility when they inevitably screwed up. "Now, you don't seem to be into attacking us, which means you're here for a different reason."

"Precisely that, Rokubi Jinchuuriki." The masked man nodded. "I merely came to barter an exchange."

"If you think for _one second_ that we'll just go quietly..." Yagura's threat was double-fold when the wind began to pick up, whirling around the Sanbi Jinchuuriki like a deadly tornado waiting to be unleashed.

"I hold no such illusion." There was a noticeable pause, and the masked man fixed his gaze upon Yagura. "Do _you_ hold such an illusion, Yondaime Mizukage?"

This time, Utakata was too late in preventing Yagura's attack, and the Sanbi Jinchuuriki leapt towards the man with a guttural snarl, and the hook-staff was brought down on the masked man, only to slip right through him, and crush the railing beneath the mysterious Akatsuki leader. The masked man said nothing, only leaping to another, further edge of the boat, this time leaning against the railing.

"Good try. That one almost got me." The tone was mocking, and Utakata didn't think it helped matters. This man – whether or not he actually _was_ Madara – was the source of a huge chip on Yagura's shoulder, and picked at the wounds he made on the former Yondaime with careful deliberation. Taking a deep breath, Utakata put as much as he could safely spare into creating a bubble large and strong enough to hold Yagura back.

" _If_ you're not Uchiha Madara, then why use his name?" Utakata tried to ignore Yagura's enraged screams as he attacked the surface of the bubble, instead focusing on the man before him.

"Isn't it obvious?" The masked head tilted slightly, the curves casting dark shadows against the light of the moon. "Madara is a name that gets results. Had I used any other name, none of you would have reacted as I wanted."

"Then who are you?" The words came out like a snarl, and Utakata kept an ear out for the other boats. With all the commotion going on, someone was bound to notice and do something.

"Does it matter?" The masked man questioned, his voice full of amusement. "Events have proceeded too far for my identity to matter. Even if you were to kill me here and now, the war would still occur, and I would remain without identity in the eyes of the world."

"Akatsuki will fall." Utakata grit his teeth, fingers curling inwards, wrapping around his bubble pipe.

"But the war is not integral on Akatsuki's involvement." Again, the masked man was cryptic, and it was beginning to grate on Utakata's nerves. "We have allies who, even now, are preparing to do battle against the Elemental Nations for our cause."

"But–"

"That is enough free information. My turn for answers." The masked man tilted his head back, letting the full light of the moon shine upon him. "You have abandoned your native villages in favor of traveling together. Why?"

"Because not everyone finds their lives fulfilling living as the strongest weapon of their country's Shinobi Corps." Utakata tersely replied, purposely avoiding giving away any relevant information.

"Perhaps I should rephrase, then." The masked figure didn't sound amused. "Every single one of you were safest when you were allied with a Shinobi village. What purpose is served by abandoning that safety in favor of a more... nomadic lifestyle?"

"Safety is overrated." Utakata blithely replied. "You just can't rely on it anymore."

"Fascinating." The figure hummed. "And you chose to rely on one another?"

"No more than you're guys rely on each other." Utakata parried, which was answer enough.

"I doubt that." The figure clearly got the subtext. "But you've given me almost enough that I'll consider answering more of your questions." He pointed at the bubble holding Yagura. "Release him. My next question is for your Yondaime."

"He won't tell you anything." Utakata considered acquiescing to the man's request. It was quickly becoming more trouble than it was worth holding the Sanbi Jinchuuriki back. "In fact, I believe he'll want something from you instead."

"I already told you, my death will not forestall the coming war. If anything, it will force the hand of my ally. I would not wish you to suffer his wrath." The masked figure replied, his tone making it sound as though they were discussing dinner plans. "But it wouldn't matter whether you choose to release him or not. Either way, I _will_ be getting my answer."

Utakata held the man's glare – while staring at the figure's right hand with vested interest, instead of turning his gaze towards the hidden face with glowing eyes – before sighing, and with a snap of the fingers, Yagura was freed. The silver-haired Jinchuuriki slammed the hook-staff against the deck, using it to propel himself towards the masked figure. With a silent snarl, the hook-staff was brought forth in a swing that was stopped in its tracks against the outstretched palm of the figure.

"That wasn't–" The rest of the sentence was lost when Yagura kicked both feet out, sending a blast of wind at his adversary. Before it could make contact, the masked figure dodged, diving through the hook-staff and letting the wind jutsu explode against the sea harmlessly. Whatever joviality had existed in the man was long gone with the attack, and his entire form radiated displeasure and annoyance. Were they not so immersed in the salty sea air, Utakata was sure that the ambient chakra would be set aflame from the sheer amount of fire chakra the masked man exuded in his anger. "That." Two gloved hands slapped against one another, sparking the air into twin trails of flame that spun and twirled in the air like whips. "Is." A flick of the wrist, and the fire-whips snapped, one curling around the hook-staff while the other came down upon the former Mizukage. "Enough." The whip was dodged, but Jinchuuriki and weapon were parted. "I shall indulge this petty vengeance of yours no longer!"

"Petty vengeance?" And if that wasn't the most shocked tone of voice Utakata had ever heard coming from Yagura's mouth, then color him white and call him Saiken.

_**Do not include me in your human expressions.** _

"We are Shinobi; we are taught from birth that such things can and do happen." The masked figure's tone was clipped. "Do not act the aggrieved party when you know perfectly well otherwise."

" _Years._ " Yagura's voice was straining, matching his inability to hold back. "You stole away _years_ of my life. Years I cannot steal back. I am well-assured of my place as the aggrieved."

"I needed to test something, and you were the most viable candidate." The masked head tilted, the tone as if he were imparting important knowledge. "The testing of jutsu on live subjects – preferably Shinobi of the likes that will ultimately fall prey to the jutsu – is one of the required steps in jutsu creation."

"The entirety of the Land of Water was devolved into civil war to _test a jutsu_." Utakata couldn't believe it.

"Indeed." The masked man nodded, gesturing to Yagura. "Your Yondaime holds information about that jutsu that I require. It is still in development, you see."

"To refine it, you mean." Yagura always was quick to the point, Utakata mused.

"If you wish to put it in so blunt and crass a term, yes." Utakata, at this point, was looking back at the neighboring boats, and up at the bridge. Surely someone would notice? "It is a Genjutsu, as you already know."

"To what purpose?" Yagura's snarl brought Utakata's attention back to the scene at hand. "Why does Akatsuki want the Biju? What role does this Genjutsu have in your plans?"

"Biju?" Even though neither Jinchuuriki were watching the masked figure's face, they could hear the interest and curiosity. "Is that what you call those chakra beasts you hold? Oh, how _quaint_."

"Answer my question!" Yagura screamed, sending another blast of air at the figure, who dodged once more.

"Only after you answer mine." A finger was held up, a mocking gesture if Utakata had ever seen one. "How did you escape my Genjutsu? None of your previous methods worked, if you recall."

"I'll never tell you." Yagura growled, eyes flickering from the hook-staff at the far end of the deck and back to the masked man. "But when I do, know that you'll only have seconds left to live, if that."

"Withholding information?" The figure tsked in mock-disappointment. "Now that isn't very sportsmanlike of you, now is it?"

"It's called common sense." Yagura barked back. "Once I tell you how it works, then you will use it against me in battle. No, the day I tell you is the day I kill you."

"If you tell me, you have to kill me?" The figure echoed back. "That's rather childish thinking of you. I expected better." There was a sigh, and the head lowered, bathing the entire front of the mask in shadow. "But very well. I shall abide by it – for now. Akatsuki's ultimate goal, you asked?"

"And you're allies. Who are they?" Yagura might have been blinded by rage, but Utakata had been calm and in control when these mysterious allies were mentioned.

"Oh, it's just one ally. But he's got many subordinates, and a far reach. Indeed, you may have heard of him." The figure chuckled, the mask rising just enough to let the shine of the moon bleed over his eyes. "Does the name Orochimaru ring any bells?"

Oh, _hell_. The monster's name had gone down in history after that attack on Konoha that ended with the death of the Sandaime Hokage, and the temporary release of Shukaku. Despite all their pestering, Naruto and Gaara had remained fastidiously tight-lipped about that day, a clear sore spot for both boys. If Orochimaru was involved, the chance of them just getting fed up at the war and locking the enemy in a room with Naruto until they joined his side had bottomed out. There was _no way_ Naruto could work that creepy charm of his on that psychopath.

A glance at Yagura showed that the elder man was following the same train of thought as he, and he turned his attention back at the masked figure.

"Oh, so you _have_ heard of him!" The voice was far too joyous to be real, and just further proved how much this man was mocking them. "As for the other question you wanted, well, have you ever wondered where those chakra beasts you hold originated?"

"The Juubi." The words were a whisper on the wind, traveling far from their source – Yagura, who was staring at the masked figure in shock. Utakata, however, was looking at Yagura in shock. Juubi. _Ten_ \- tails. _Did_ such a thing exist?

"That's one name for it." The masked figure tilted his head in acquiescence. "Other, more common names for it are Datara, Deidarabocchi, Ame no Hitotsu no Kami – the One-Eyed God, a title I find most fitting. Some say that it is the Origin."

"Origin of what?" Utakata glanced from one figure to the other. "Yagura, what is he talking about?"

"Is that dissent amongst the ranks I hear?" The masked figure took on a reproachful tone, before the eyes brightened in knowing mischief. "Keeping secrets, Tadashii? That's so unlike you."

Utakata didn't need to even consider the statement to know the figure was baiting the former Mizukage. His hands flitted through a series of seals, and a surge of seawater exploded over the side of the deck, forming a wall separating both Jinchuuriki and the masked figure.

"That is _enough_!" Utakata was furious – at this masked figure for _daring_ to taunt them like this, at Yagura for keeping a secret of this magnitude from everyone else, at himself for not intervening sooner. He turned his ire on the masked figure. "You wanted information from us. Why? Why not just take the both of us down right here, right now?"

"As I've already said, Tadashii holds information that is pertinent to my endgame." Behind Utakata, Yagura snarled obscenities. "And the technique used to extract the tailed beasts takes time; time that is currently a rarity given the state of affairs the Elemental Nations are in. No, no. When I bring you in, this war you are waging will be lost, and each of you will have days left to live."

"We won't go down without a fight." Utakata's retort came despite the breakdown of the water wall – without his full concentration on maintaining the jutsu, it was falling apart. "This Akatsuki you've formed will fall against us."

"And you truly believe that you won't fall with them?" The masked man scoffed, clearly mocking their brave words. "Such naivety is unbecoming. You Jinchuuriki _will_ fall, farther and harder than any before you. You can only pray that death will find you before you land." The words were spoken with such surety and malice that Utakata was surprised that he wasn't cut from their impact. "I shall ask you once more: how did you escape my Genjutsu?"

"Why's it so important to you?" The words were out of Utakata's mouth before he knew they were there. There had to be a reason why Yagura's escape from the Genjutsu was so important. Understanding dawned on his face as the Rokubi Jinchuuriki realized. "That was it, wasn't it? He escaped the Genjutsu you plan on projecting from the moon. You want to know how he did it to prevent it happening again."

"Very perceptive." The masked figure tilted his head, glowing eyes obscured in shadow once more. "But whatever answer he gives will only be confirmation of my postulations. And the conditions of those postulations can only be met be someone like you two, someone who will not exist in the dream world: a Jinchuuriki."

Oh.

 _Shit._ If only a Jinchuuriki could escape the Genjutsu, then that meant that only the immense chakra agitation that was caused when in contact with Yokai was the only way out.

"Then why ask for what you already know?" Utakata couldn't see the point of this – asking for such specific information without a method to ensure that the informant couldn't warn the other side was tactical idiocy.

"Why indeed..." The masked man seemed to muse to himself, before Utakata realized what was going on.

He was stalling.

"Shit!" Utakata darted forth, thin arms wrapping around Yagura's midsection as both Jinchuuriki leapt over the railing, and didn't stop until he was a safe distance away.

"What are you–" Yagura didn't get to finish his question as the boat they were on exploded in a pillar of fire, a beacon of light in the night.

"As I said." The masked figure appeared before them, his form dragging long shadows along the surface of the ocean as the pillar blazed behind him. "Very perceptive."

"Why kill us if you want us alive?" There was something inherently _wrong_ about this entire exchange, something far worse than the explosion.

"What purpose is a war if neither side is clear in their intentions?" The mask tilted as the figure tilted his head, his voice a low drawl. "Besides, if my postulations are correct, then it is only the two of you and the two Jinchuuriki of Kumogakure that will not be under the cloak of Akatsuki by dawn's light."

Utakata reacted on instinct, hands flying through the signs necessary for the pillar of water to explode out from beneath the figure, only to be met by an equally large pillar of fire to explode from the figure. The two jutsu clashed, bathing the entire area in stifling fog that condensed against Utakata and Yagura's skins and made them feel the chill of the air. When it cleared, the masked figure had vanished from sight, although neither Jinchuuriki lowered their guard. When the seconds ticked past and still no appearance or attack was made, Utakata's guard began to lower. When the seconds dwindled into minutes, Yagura allowed himself to relax. In the close distance, the neighboring boats had stopped, and distant figures ran atop the water, growing closer and larger.

"Something feel off about the whole thing to you?" Utakata finally spoke up, glancing at his companion briefly before returning to looking around him. "We got more questions than we did answers."

"I beg to differ." Yagura's response was all Utakata got before Ao appeared leading a group of Kiri-nin to their location, babbling about their state of being. While the Sanbi Jinchuuriki gave the Sensor-Nin his understanding of how things went down, along with what little information they'd gleamed, Utakata had joined in with his own little tidbits, supplementing Yagura's information wherever possible. He couldn't help but wonder what it was about the masked man that Yagura had been able to glean that he couldn't. With one last glance at the burning remains of the boat they'd been on, and with a silent prayer to the lives lost because of it, Utakata turned to rejoin with the Kiri-nin and continue their journey to the Land of Lightning.

There was something completely off about that entire exchange, and he'd figure it out no matter what the outcome.


	39. Puppet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enemies hide in the dark of the night. Enemies hide in plain sight. Naruto and Fu are in for a fright.

Naruto stayed close to Fu, the two of them standing amidst a group of enemies. And yet...

They weren't enemies. All of them looked familiar as faces that Naruto had gazed at and had personally shook hands with or been congratulated by; every single person in sight was a Konoha-nin, and they'd sworn to protect both Jinchuuriki with their lives should they come across any of the enemy.

Another projectile flew through the air, this time blocked by a small square of earth that was sent into its path by Fu, and Naruto's hands flew into the sign needed to create Shadow Clones, only to have to abandon the attempt at the jutsu as one of the Shinobi – a Jonin he vaguely recognized as the proctor of the third part of the Chunin exams, and who'd introduced himself as Genma – leapt forward, Kunai in hand.

"Chakra strings!" Genma hissed as Naruto blocked the attack. "Can't control my body!"

Another Jonin – with a lightning-shaped scar on his face, said his name was Raido – lobbied a kick at Naruto, only to be met with Fu. Several of the other platoon members rallied to Raido's defense, and drew Fu away from Naruto, who cursed at the two of them being separated. Genma leapt back with a kick to Naruto's stomach before the attack continued. There was an almost-silent whistling in the air, and Naruto dodged several more Senbon, watching with concern as they hit several of the controlled platoon members. The hit Shinobi spasmed briefly before falling to the ground.

"The Senbon were meant for you!" Genma called to Naruto, and the two once more engaged, trading blows. "They likely aren't deadly poisons but paralytics. Focus!"

"Where's the puppeteer, can you tell?" Naruto blocked another kick, only to be forced to dodge a swipe from the man's Kunai, which glistened with a dark liquid in the moonlight. Once more Senbon flew through the air, and once more Naruto had been forced to dodge, letting them hit several more platoon members, affording the blond Jinchuuriki a brief glimpse at Fu, who appeared to be holding her own against a dozen of the Chunin.

"No go!" Another wave of attacks; another half-dozen down. "Puppeteer's good; half these attackers aren't even real Konoha-nin, and the enemy's gotta be at least two. No way to find them like this!"

"Dammit!" Naruto had hoped that the platoon members would be able to help find the... puppeteer... "Akasuna no Sasori!" Naruto snapped out a kick, hands slamming pushing against Genma's chest to give him better momentum. "He's a puppeteer with Akatsuki; small red-head, young!"

There was a cry from behind, and Naruto flung himself through the air towards Fu, who had fallen with a dozen Senbon lodged in her back. However, before he could reach her, a giant sword slammed itself into the ground, attached to the arm of what was clearly a puppet clad in a dark red cloak.

"Shit!" Naruto whirled around, bouncing out of the way from the puppet, while all around him more and more of the red cloaked figures appeared out of the dark, with the rest of the platoon falling the same as Fu did. He was alone against an army of puppets. Well, not exactly 'alone', but...

"Did you really think you could escape me?" The voice was everywhere, digging deep into Naruto's memories, reminding him of a dark cave and a hunched-over figure made of wood. "I've been waiting for this chance for over three years; it is not often that one can defeat my Hiruko so easily." Naruto spun, a pair of Kunai in hand, flinging them towards where he thought the voice was coming from, only to hit a black-haired puppet. "Do not think me so weak!"

Naruto jumped, barely avoiding the onslaught of Senbon and Kunai that slammed into his previous location. His hands flew into the familiar, unique hand sign for Shadow Clones, and the around him exploded into chakra smoke as over a dozen copies appeared, the original concealed within their group. Together, the clones used one another as springboards, launching each other towards a single puppet, Kunai and Shuriken ablaze in Wind Chakra. Before they could reach their targets, however, the downed Shinobi moved to intercept, and Naruto, with a curse, had to launch a second volley of Kunai to intercept the first. All around him, more of the downed platoon were rising again, including...

"Oh, _hell_." Fu. Sasori was in control of Fu. _Shit..._

He couldn't use the Contract Seals on them, least of all on Fu; the Seal was designed to disrupt any outside chakra connections the object it was applied to had, and in this state of war, any Summoning Contracts held by these platoon members would undoubtedly be necessary weapons in battle. Worse still, if Fu, a Jinchuuriki, was hit with a Contract Seal, it would be the undoing of both herself and Chomei. Jinchuuriki and Biju would be forced apart, and neither would survive the process; Chomei's death would be impermanent, yes, but Fu was the first, and quite possibly last, Jinchuuriki that the Biju would find itself endeared towards.

Paralysis Seals, then, on anything that moved. Naruto nodded to the clones, and several of them clapped their hands together, running through a different set of Hand Seals, until their hands glowed with a soft golden flame. These clones would go after the platoon members, ensuring their safety as the battle went on; and if they happened to hit some of the puppets as well... well, that just made things easier.

The clones leapt into action, dispersing with open fists into the fray of the enemy. Two clones stayed back, flanking the original as the battle began in a flurry of Kunai and glowing fists full of chakra and various weapons coated in the vibrant glistening colors of poisons. While the platoon plus Fu normally held unique styles of Taijutsu, they weren't making use of it; they could only fight as Sasori commanded them. This was to Naruto's advantage, as he didn't have to counter over a dozen different Taijutsu styles. He used this to his advantage, using similar moves and blocks to land hits, applying the Paralysis Seals that froze both human and puppet into place. Humans were left frozen in time, while puppets dropped as their strings were cut, falling to the ground as more replaced each fallen comrade. In the middle of it all stood the real, original Naruto, fingers interlaced in the Hand Seal required to make new clones to replace fallen ones as the puppets fought back.

"An ingenious use of the Paralysis Seal." Again Sasori's voice came from everywhere and nowhere, and it filled Naruto with a sense of dread as the functioning puppets flew backwards, vanishing into the shadows of the forest. "But how will you survive against distance fighting?"

And then the forest was filled with a soft slithering noise, almost quiet enough to not be heard, that reminded Naruto uncomfortably of Gaara's sand in motion, only much more metallic, like metal shavings grinding against itself. When he focused hard on the shadows to his left, where the sound emanated from, it appeared as if the shadows themselves were alive and writhing, almost pulsating with a dull shine in the moonlight. It only took a single glance from the writhing not-shadows to the immobilized platoon members and back before he knew what to do.

Naruto ran. He knew that he was leaving Fu alone, susceptible to capture, but he held enough confidence that she would at least be safe for the time being if he kept the battle going. If Sasori had really been intent of capturing just one of them, then the attack would already be over and Fu would be vanished into the dark. It was a gamble, but one that he was left with out of a distinct lack of other options.

He didn't need to look behind him to know that whatever it was had followed him: the leaves and smaller branches sounded like they were being ripped to shreds as the mysterious _thing_ flew through the forest in chase. Naruto only stopped running when the slithering metallic screeching surrounded him and he was left having to blindly dodge metallic spikes as they shone in the moonlight.

A shadow from above coated the ground around Naruto in blackness, and with it came Sasori's voice. "Do you like it? This is the feared iron sand of my favorite puppet: the Sandaime Kazekage. It took so many years to perfect him, but it was well worth the effort."

Iron sand. And likely coated in the same poisons as all the other puppets' weapons were. Joy.

Naruto swore as he jumped up in the air, hands flying through a barrage of seals as he inhaled. The now identified iron sand had followed, surrounding Naruto in the makings of a sphere, only to explode outwards as the blond unleashed the barrage of compressed air balls formed from the jutsu. With that opening, Naruto created a clone as a launching pad, leaping out of the black sphere and further upwards, towards the puppet floating high in the air with black wings made of iron sand. He barely paid any mind to the scratches he'd garnered from the iron shavings in the escape, leaving both it and the poison to be countered by his Kekkei Genkai. He was mere feet from the puppet when a triangular spear of iron sand shot up from the trees below, slicing Naruto's jacket open and creating a long, thin gash across his torso.

"Shit!" Another clone to jump off of and sacrifice to the iron hail that came raining down from the puppets' wings, and Naruto was crashing through the treetops, until he could get a good enough hold on one of tree trunks to stop. When he finally did, his chakra and blood was bubbling over the wound across his chest, hissing and sizzling as it sealed itself shut and faded away in mere seconds, and his vision was becoming unfocused, his breathing getting heavier, thicker. The tips of his fingers began to go cold before numbness set in, slowly spreading down his fingers and hand, making it feel like countless insects were crawling beneath his skin, clawing their way out. It was worse for his chest, where the gash had been. It felt like an iron, so frozen cold it was burning and stinging, was eating away at his skin, digging deeper and deeper with each passing second.

"You look tired. Is it the paralytic?" If there was any emotion in Sasori's voice, it came off as mocking. Naruto tried to leap to another tree, tried to find somewhere to hide from Sasori's view, only to fall into the branches, barely able to feel them as the numbness set in. Branches buckled and snapped beneath his weight, until he finally hit one that could hold his weight. Sasori's voice appeared again, closer now. "You see, when I first heard that my target was you, Uzumaki Naruto, Kyuubi Jinchuuriki, I admit that I felt elated. You see, I am a petty creature, and what you've done, destroying _my_ Hiruko, without using a single jutsu?" Here there was chuckling, and Naruto was struggling as his body burned through the poison. He needed to stall for as long as possible. "Well, I think these my actions in this encounter speak volumes, don't you?"

"Why do you want us?" He needed just a few more minutes. Already he could feel the buzzing, stinging pins and needles as feeling returned to his extremities.

"Isn't it obvious?" Out of the shadows directly in front of Naruto another puppet appeared, sporting short, vibrant red hair and half-lidded green-gray eyes, with a long cable slithering out of where his stomach should have been, and a dark, dull red cylinder bearing the kanji for 'scorpion' – Sasori's name itself. "Biju are power incarnate. As they are held now only ensures that the status of the world remains the same. Jinchuuriki are puppets of their native Hidden Villages, weapons at the ready, and yet you are locked away to rust and age, losing your potency. Our goal is to take these weapons and place them in more capable hands." The puppet landed at the edge of the branch Naruto was laying on, settling its weight upon the aged wood before the cable retracted, a thin, sharp blade slithering back into place within the abdominal cavity.

"Then why don't you face me yourself, instead of talking through this ugly puppets of yours." Feeling was returning to his fingers now, but his nerves were still too raw to do anything.

"But I _am_ facing you directly, Uzumaki Naruto." The puppet's head tilted slightly, the ghost of a smile on it's face. "I created a work of art out of my very own skin and bones. My body is a highly honed weapon, forever in its prime condition, while yours will only grow to waste and decay. As a puppet, you're amateurish at best."

_Now!_

What happened next could only be described as a blur, but suddenly Naruto was leaning against the trunk of a tree several meters away from where he'd been, with a massive black rectangle inhabiting the space he'd once been at. The red-haired puppet – Sasori – was nowhere to be seen, in his place was instead the puppet from before, with short black hair and a rust-red cloak opened to reveal a chestplate that had pulled back, revealing preserved muscles that glowed with chakra.

"I hope you don't mind, but I'd rather not be in the middle of this. My Sandaime Kazekage really does not like sub-par puppetry." Sasori's mocking voice came from everywhere and nowhere, and it was really starting to grate on Naruto's nerves. However, he couldn't dwell on the puppeteer, not when the puppet was the real problem that needed addressed.

Without missing a beat, Naruto created a dozen clones, this time their hands weren't aflame, but a dull glow on each palm belied the incantation for a Contract Seal – all it took was a single application to separate jutsu from caster.

The crack of tree branches was all the warning Naruto had before the triangular spear shot down from above, slicing through the trees as it sought its target. The spear shifted, moving to join together with the rectangular block, forming a sphere. For the briefest of moments, there was silence, with only a dozen Narutos spread out amongst the trees surrounding the puppet and the black sphere. And then the puppet flew up, high above the treetop, as the metal sphere began to scream, exploding outwards in spiked veins, fragmenting into smaller and smaller spikes, driving into and through the surrounding foliage. They permeated the air like black metal veins, filled with poison. The Naruto clones were vanished in plumes of smoke, while the original was left standing in the midst of the maze of spikes, one sleeve of his jacket half-torn off.

"Shit." His arm was bleeding sluggishly, with several more cuts scattered across the rest of his body. Already he could feel the paralytic dulling his senses, numbing his nerves once more. His hands were curled into the rat Hand Sign, and the air around him rippled and ran thick with chakra. Steam filled the air as the poison was burned from his system and his wounds closed themselves.

Naruto had to get close to apply the Contract Seal to stop the metal sand; but he had to stop the metal sand to apply the Contract Seal. If it worked like Gaara's sand did, then there was no escaping it. Except this seemed more offensive than anything else, ensuring that there was no getting close. Time now to try something new, take some risks.

More clones were made, and a smoke bomb was dropped, hiding the number from the clones as well as hiding their escape. The metal spikes pulled away, forming tiny balls that sharpened into needles as they flew into the smoke, intent on destroying what it hid from view, only to reveal nothing but empty air. The needles were left as they were, stabbed in the trees as what remained pulled back, curling close to the puppet in the form of wings. Now the true battle began.

From the darkness flew out several Kunai and Shuriken, aimed at the puppet Kazekage. They made it as close as ten feet before they froze, momentum lost as they fell under the magnetic field of the puppet's chakra. The frozen weapons hung in the air long enough for the Narutos who'd thrown them to know of their failure, before they were pulled into the wings, where the scream of metal-on-metal could be heard as the weapons were assimilated into the metal sand. In retaliation, a volley of sand needles were sent towards the origin of the weapons, and the explosions of shadow clones could be heard.

"This puppet is not one you can fight from a distance." Once more Sasori's voice permeated the air, and each of the Narutos remaining heard the voice as clearly as if it were being spoken over each of their shoulders. "However, nor is it one you can fight up close. Your defeat is nigh inevitable."

More Kunai came flying from the trees, wire tying sizzling explosive tags to them. However, before they could even get close enough to detonate, the puppet's left arm shot forward, and several opposing Kunai were sent out, intercepting and slicing through the wire, separating explosive tag from Kunai. The Kunai continued on their path, and were absorbed into the puppet's cache of metal sand, while the explosive tags went off without taking down their intended target.

In the aftermath of the attack, both combatants were silent. Sasori was well-contented with this brief reprieve, as any attacks on his side did not require lengthy preparation. Even if Naruto was able to divine his position, Sasori was never without defense. The Jinchuuriki would fall, of this Sasori was sure.

Another Kunai, just one this time, flew out from the shadow of the forest. There was nothing attached to this one, although Sasori noted that the handle-grip was marginally thicker than was the norm. As with the ones that came before, it was halted before it could hit the puppet's exposed heart, and was pulled into the left metal wing for assimilation.

All the warning Sasori had was a faint sizzle before the explosive tag wrapped around the handle of the Kunai went off. Flames engulfed the entire upper body of the puppet as the tag's compressed reality exploded in a burst of hellfire, and just as soon as the appeared did the fireball collapse in on itself, pulled inward by the pocket dimensions' collapse. What remained of the puppet was little more than an arm and two legs, held together by what barely passed for a torso. The remaining metal sand hung in the air for a moment more as the chakra remnants of the jutsu consumed itself, before falling to the forest floor.

"Ha!" A lone Naruto appeared out of the dark, bouncing into the light of the moon wearing a shit-eating grin as the remnants of the Kazekage puppet fell to the forest floor below. "What was that you said, about my defeat being inevitable?"

"The battle is not over." The blade-tip cable shot out of the forest, zooming through the air towards Naruto, who dodged it. Once he did, the cable curved in the air, twisting to hit him. "Do you think I have not done battle with others proficient in that clone jutsu you use? You are foolish, to come face me directly."

"How do you know I'm not a clone?" Naruto panted, twisting in the air to avoid the blades' pointed tip, the beginning hints of a smirk on his face.

"You dodge." The cable curled again, twisting in the air and it sought its target. "No clone would bother to avoid a deadly attack, when death is pointless to such a creation."

"Ever heard of a distraction?" Naruto's voice did not come from the one dodging, but from behind Sasori. There was a whirl of wind, and an explosion of fire; the Naruto that had been dodging the cable bounced away as it was pulled back into the puppeteer's abdomen.

"Very good." Sasori stood before him, metal tubes protruding from the palms of his hands, their ends still smoking from the burst of fire he'd unleashed on the clone. "But you've stopped dodging."

Naruto twisted, his chakra already starting to gather, as he turned around to face... nothing.

_Oh shit!_

The real attack came from Sasori, whom Naruto had turned his back towards. Fire burned through the air, lighting the forest ablaze as Naruto was forced on the move, running away from the fire. There was no hiding as the forest exploded into flame, and any cover either combatant might have had was lost. Naruto bounced through the air, hands pressed together as he prepared to attack. Unable to get in close to destroy the puppet body itself, he was left with little option else but to use Wind Release – Futon – jutsu. Inhaling, he felt the air in his lungs begin to compress, forming spheres that were soon launched at the source of the flames.

"Haven't you ever heard the expression 'fanning the flames'?" Sasori's tone was mocking as the twin streams of fire were moved to engulf the oncoming attacks, using the compressed air to make the streams explode into twin pillars of flame. The entire forest surrounding the two was coated in fire, and the sky above rumbled with thunder as rainclouds began to form. Even more Futon jutsu attacks were launched into the flames, making them rise higher and higher.

"Absolutely," was Naruto's reply as gale-force winds came down upon the battlefield, twisting and spinning the air as lightning cracked through the sky. "I also know that everything burns. How's that puppet body treating you, by the way?"

 _Ah_. So that was the Jinchuuriki's plan; to burn him to ash from the flames.

"It is perfection." Sasori cut off the flames, and knew that the scroll that held the flames he'd used was disintegrating as it consumed itself, its contents emptied. To do this he would need to use the water scroll. "Are you planning on killing me with fire?"

"Close." And then there were a dozen identical Jinchuuriki popping up on Sasori's senses; more shadow clones had been made, and they were spreading out, moving through the flames to surround him. There was a burst of chakra as they all simultaneously unleashed some jutsu, but whatever they were clearly were not aimed towards him. There was another crash of thunder directly above Sasori, and the wind began to pick up, whirling and swirling all around him, coming from all directions and meeting right where he stood...

"You little shi-" was all that Sasori was able to get out as the tornado came crashing down on his location, a massive tunnel of cutting wind tore into his puppet body for the briefest of moments before it pulled in the flames from the forest. Cutting wind met fire and Sasori's body became lost amidst the summary tornado of fire.

Outside the pillar of flames, eleven Narutos popped out of existence, leaving a lone Jinchuuriki standing in the rain, watching as the downpour obliterated the flaming tornado until nothing was left. A large patch of now-dead land lay before Naruto, filled with scorched, sizzling land. Whatever had been left of Sasori was ash in the wind.

"Wow." Naruto panted, before devolving into giggles. "I am _so_ telling the others about that!" A pause, and then... "Crap!"

Naruto took off towards where he'd left the downed platoon– and Fu. With luck, this attack had just been Sasori alone, and his partner wasn't waiting in the background to strike when they had the chance. Even so, Naruto hoped Fu wasn't too upset with him when he told her about the battle later. She tended to get a little... upset, he decided, when she was faced with defeat from an opponent that an ally could defeat; he'd learned that much from all those training spars with the others over the years.

He really hoped the others were okay. He didn't think he could survive losing any of them.


	40. Alliances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Preparations on all sides as the war casts shadow over the continent.

"At oh-two hundred fifteen hours today, Akatsuki member Sasori placed an ambush on the platoon harboring the two Jinchuuriki, Uzumaki Naruto and Fu. One casualty was reported, that of Sasori of the Red Sand, Missing-Nin of Suna, but otherwise no fatalities. All involved are being presently looked over by the medical corps. Sasori, according to reports, had turned his body into a puppet, and was burned to ash by Naruto. Further reports indicate that one of the puppets used were that of the Sandaime Kazekage. However, nothing of either body could be retrieved. Both Jinchuuriki are safe." Tsunade nodded at Shikaku,who stepped away from the circular table where the Kages were seated. From behind Onoki, Kitsuchi stepped forward.

"At eighteen hundred fifty hours yesterday, Iwa Missing-Nin and Akatsuki member Deidara attacked Iwagakure directly, engaging in battle with both Lord Tsuchikage and Jinchuuriki Roshi. No fatalities, while casualties number half a dozen injured. All are expected to fully recover and be battle-ready by day's end. Deidara perished in the battle, such no part of his body could be recovered. Both Jinchuuriki are safe." Kitsuchi stepped back, and Chiyo's aide stepped forward.

"twenty-three hundred twenty-two hours yesterday, Akatsuki member Hidan attempted negotiation with Rokudaime Kazekage to attempt to gain control over Jinchuuriki Gaara. Hidan perished in battle against Gaara, as capture was not possible. No fatalities, while casualties number over two dozen, Kazekage and Jinchuuriki included, and have undergone examination by the medical corps; all are battle-ready. The Jinchuuriki is safe."

The aide stepped back, and Mei's aide stepped forth. He gave a report much the same as the others, down to the very last detail, setting the papers down before the Mizukage.

"An alliance with Orochimaru." Ay, the Raikage, looked at Tsunade. "You are, of course, willing to supply intel with all information regarding him?"

"Already done." She leaned forward, fingers intertwined. "It also gives us the advantage that this man, this... Madara, for lack of a real identity, also has over us."

"Akatsuki consists only of this Madara and the subordinate, Zetsu. The main battle force is that of Orochimaru we must worry about. This... Otogakure." Mei flipped through the papers before her. "Any and all knowledge we have on it will be relevant to our attack. I trust Konoha has shared its' intel on Otogakure's location with the ambush squad?"

"We have." Tsunade nodded towards Chiyo, who continued.

"One of our own, Kankuro, will lead the squad. He's got a good head on his shoulders for battlefield tactics, like all puppeteers." She frowned at the Hokage. "Although I will admit I don't like that you weren't able to get anything out of my sweet little grandson. None of his puppets were salvageable?"

"Not even the Sandaime Kazekage." Tsunade grimaced, looking all the world like she didn't want to say anything else. "My apologies."

"In any event, we now have the advantage of knowing the enemy's HQ." Ay tapped a beat against the table. "We have the Jinchuuriki, and the Akatsuki lies weak. The time to mourn can wait."

"Impudent, brat. Impudent." Onoki bowed his head toward Ay. "The passing of a Kage, no matter the circumstances, holds itself unto certain traditions. Due respect must be paid to the fallen."

"This is a time of war. Due respect shall be had, but the time of mourning must wait. We have more pressing matters to attend to." Ay tapped the bundle of papers before him. "First comes the plan of attack."

"Battle lines must be drawn. You cannot intend to march to the enemies doorstep and expect to win." Mei gestured to the map at the center of the table. "If we march on Orochimaru and this false Madara, we will meet in their terms, their terrain. They will have the advantage over us."

"And you wish to have _them_ march on _us_?" Onoki scoffed. "They are two men, while we are near eighty thousand strong."

"The enemy is Orochimaru." Tsunade rebuked, jabbing a finger at the older man. "His strength is not to be underestimated. Konoha nearly fell against him."

"He had the might of Suna behind him then." Chiyo harrumphed. "The stripling holds no such power now."

"Perhaps not, but prudence is best in this situation. Their terrain, their advantage." Tsunade tapped at the table to accentuate her point.

"We have the numbers advantage. What possible advantage they might have would be futile." Onoki insisted.

"Four Akatsuki members went after the Jinchuuriki, knowing that they were returned to their villages, as well as harboring knowledge of our alliance." Ay pointed at the Land of Sound on the map. "They will have planned us marching on them. The Hokage is right; we are better served having them bring the battle to us."

Tsunade smirked at Onoki in victory, while Mei nodded assent. From behind Tsunade, Shikaku stepped forward, pulling out a small, thin scroll from within his vest pocket.

"If I may, I had some ideas about deployment..."

~~***~~

The air was thin with chill, and through the fog, sharp spires jutted out, connected with sinews of vegetation. They towered high above the sky, threatening to blot out the sun, while below the sea bucked and roiled.

Yugito smiled, breathing in the familiar stinging chill. It smelled like childhood, like home. She was currently sitting atop one of those spires, watching the boat come in. Far below, Motoi was greeting the other Jinchuuriki, while Bee was resting back at the lodge. Legs swinging, the blonde let gravity take her down. It was time to greet the Jinchuuriki.

Down, she fell, wind and waterspray flitting across her space as she entered freefall. It ended soon enough, as Yugito landed on a lower spire, hands and feet tapping against worn stone and bouncing, letting her pounce from spire to spire, until she landed on the deck of the docked boat, right in the middle of a heated conversation between Utakata and Naruto.

"...so there I am, in the icebox, wire tied all over me. Out in the morgue there's my class, half of them passed out, the other half stabbing the cadavers. Now– oh! Yugito!" Utakata waved at her, before it sank in what he was doing, and yanked his arm back in, up against his body.

"Yeah, hey." Naruto absentmindedly waved at her, attention focused on the older man. "C'mon, what happened next? Did they find out? How did you know they were stabbing them?"

"Naruto!" Roshi walked over, swatting the blond across the head before snagging at the teen's collar and yanking. "We're long past due for a talk about tact. Specifically, your lack of it."

"But I wanna _know_ ~." Naruto whined, but relented to being dragged by the elder man.

"So." Utakata waved a hand at the land, a forced laugh coughing out of his throat. "This is your, uh, home?"

"No." Yugito moved to lead the group toward the lodge. "It's an old training island. Jinchuuriki have been coming here for decades. Interestingly, it wasn't until the second war that the Nibi–"

"This isn't land." Fu dropped down onto the ground, pressing an ear to the dirt and running her hand through the soil. "This earth is only topsoil, covering something large."

"Alive?" Yagura eyed the ground warily.

"Can't be." Roshi replied, hoisting Naruto over his shoulder. "There's nothing alive that can grow this large."

"It's a turtle." Yugito didn't like that she had to disclose that information so early. Whatever method Fu had used to determine that the island was alive, was dangerous. "An island turtle. The Land of Lightning has cultivated its' growth for millennia. Its' shell is uniquely capable in aiding the Jinchuuriki of Kumogakure in control over their Biju."

"Control?" Fu slide up into a sitting position.

"Tailed beasts, if you please." Yagura absentmindedly corrected. "And do elaborate. What do you mean, 'control'?"

"Well, you would know." Yugito started down the path, entering the underbrush. "Your complete control over Sanbi is infamous across the Elemental Nations."

"What I have is _not_ control. It is an acquaintanceship with Isobu." Yagura snarled. Utakata patted him on the shoulder, pushing him towards Gaara.

"Ah, he's got issues. Not with you, or this, but he recently came across the source of these issues, and..."

"Look, I don't care, really. But a 'tailed beast' is a tailed beast, and they can't really be reasoned with. Bee was a rare fluke. Hell, I'd bet good money Hachibi's the only one that could be reasoned with in _any_ capacity. Control is control is control." Yugito looked over her shoulder to see that the other Jinchuuriki had halted, looking at her in varying degrees of disgust. "What?"

"They are _not_ beasts." The words came out through clenched teeth, and Yugito's eyes fell upon the former Mizukage. "They are intelligent beings, and if you were only to _listen_ to them, you would understand that."

"And they have names." Roshi stepped forward, clapping her on arm. "They are proud names, of proud beings."

Yugito shrugged off the hand, continuing down the path. "I already told you, I don't care. You, all of you, whatever sort of camaraderie you have, or think you have, with your tailed beasts is your business. What, you think they're all the same? Kumogakure has tried reason with them. Decades of attempts of peaceful contact, and all for what? We've long since lost count of the lives lost with each attempt. Bee... once you've met him, you'll understand. There is no one quite like him. I wouldn't be at all surprised if it turns out that he annoyed Hachibi into whatever-it-is the two of them have."

"You..." Fu slid into standing, hands shaking in anger. "You treat them as if they are inhuman. As though they are beneath you."

"And you humanize them beyond what they are." Yugito glanced back, but did not stop moving. "Inhuman is inhuman is inhuman. Our species is not theirs. They may have intelligence, but do not consider them as us. Do you honestly believe that we are equals? And beneath us? You must be joking."

"If not beneath us, and neither our equals, then what do you consider them?" Yugito stopped, and turned to answer Fu's query.

"Gods?" She held up her arm, the rosary jangling with the movement. "They hold so much power, exist beyond human comprehension. What else _could_ they be, but Gods?"

~~***~~

There in the dark cavern, a figure crouched. Blood seeped out of a gash in his arm, sliding along the edge of his skin and down to his fingertips. The hand danced across the ground, painting intricate scripture across the entire cavern floor in blood.

" **They are gathered**." Black Zetsu grew out of the floor uncovered by scripture, until he was standing tall, a black mass against black. " **My whiter half has sent our forces on the move. The endgame is approaching.** "

"Wrong, Zetsu." The figure stood. "We are far from the endgame. This is merely the approach of a midpoint. This is merely the final brushstrokes of the first half. This diptych we paint is far from done."

" **We have already won. The rest is mere formality.** " The yellow eye glowed in the darkness, fixing the figure with an undying gaze.

"Victory cannot be claimed until the moment of the Unsealing. The paint has yet to dry, and ours is not the only brush on the canvas." The figure did not so much as look over at Black Zetsu. "As for the Jinchuuriki, how fare the preparations for their capture?"

" **He is prepared. Kisame is in place, although his victory will mean his death.** " The eye shifted. " **Danzo is on the move**."

"When is that annoyance not?" The figure paused. "We have made appropriate countermeasures. So long as he has that arm and eye, we cannot consider him anything less than a player in this game. He will not share information with the Joint Alliance that would put himself at a disadvantage." The figure turned to look Black Zetsu in the eye with gleaming Sharingan. "Are our preparations for Madara's return going well?"

" **All that remains is to apply the Sealing Tag, and to perform the Rinne Tensei.** " Black Zetsu paused. " **And we are... certain that Madara is necessary?** "

The figure turned further, fixing a two-eyed stare full of distaste. "Are you questioning his role in what's to come?"

" **Only yours.** " Black Zetsu acceded. " **The Rinne Tensei is equivalent exchange; your life for another. What can he do that you cannot?** "

"Madara is strong, far stronger than I ever will be, or could ever hope to be." The figure turned away, crouching to return to applying the scripture. "Moreover, this is his design. His legacy."

" **And yours is to die in the shadows, unknown to history.** " At this the figure froze, fingers curling into a fist before uncurling, returning to writing scripture.

"As it must be. Madara's time is coming. Mine is long past."

~~***~~

Back during the early days of the Hidden Villages, the tailed beasts were distributed to each of the nations – Yonbi, Hachibi, Ichibi, and Sanbi all to Iwa, Kumo, Suna, and Kiri, respectively, of the five principal territories – while Gobi, Nanabi, Nibi, and Rokubi were distributed to the smaller Hidden Villages. Gobi was presented to Amegakure, where it stayed until Ame's first and only Jinchuuriki was slayed by Gobi itself, and taken hold of by the Daimyo of the Land of Earth, where it resided in Jinchuuriki for Iwagakure in the decades since. Nanabi went to Takigakure, who secreted it away in their own Jinchuuriki, brought out only as agents of war. Rokubi held a brief respite in Yugakure, before it was given away to Kirigakure for an alliance during the First Great Shinobi World War. Nibi had gone to Kusagakure, where it's Jinchuuriki, Mikado Rei, was made famous for her ability to become a wraith, slaughtering countless in her battles during the first war; she continued until her death against the twins Kinkaku and Ginkaku. As reparation towards Kumogakure at the end of the First War, Nibi was released to Kumo's custody, where it has remained since.

Yagura mulled over this piece of history as he, as well as the other Jinchuuriki, were led into the lodge (which was artfully designed in a facsimile of Hachibi).

"How many Jinchuuriki came before you?" Yugito looked at the former Mizukage in surprise, and he met her stare impassively. "I ask only out of curiosity, of course. Most of us are the third to harbor our tailed beast."

Yugito nodded, although she still sounded dubious in her response. "The third as well. But the Kumo's second, to answer your question." She hesitated, before warning them once more over the oddity of this Killer Bee.

"However eccentric he may be, I doubt that he is as–" The words died on his lips as the man that could only be Bee entered to greet them.

"So many Jinchuuriki, such an oddity." Yagura could feel the wrinkles forming beneath his eyes. This... this man could not possibly– "Nice to greet yee, I'm the rapping Killer Be- urk."

"Bee!" Yugito shoved her elbow deeper into Bee's gut. "We've _talked_ about this. Remember? Decorum, pride, _lack of that insipid rapping_?"

Bee bend double, groaning out a half-hearted apology to the room at large, an apology that was drowned out when Yagura and Utakata caught sight of the sword strapped to his back.

"Where did you get that accursed sword?!" Yagura snarled as he leveled his hook-staff at the doubled-over Jinchuuriki. Naruto peeked his head through the throng and let out a cry of surprise, pointing at Samehada in recognition. It only served to further Yagura's mistrust.

"A spoil of victory against Hoshigaki Kisame." Bee replied, his tone following a rhythmic beat. "His sword took a liking to me, can't you see?" A second elbow to his gut ended the singing. "Sword took a liking to me, together we beheaded her Shinobi."

"Not possible. That sword is never disloyal to a Hoshigaki." The staff spun in place, catching the rope holding the sword to Bee's back. With a yank the sword was separated from wielder. "Do _not_ touch it!"

"You think I don't _know_ that?" Naruto side-stepped the sword as it clattered to the floor, firm hands pulling Fu and Gaara out of the way with him.

"The warning was not for your sake, Naruto." Yagura swung the hook-staff around, catching Bee at the waist and flinging him toward the far wall, opposite the fallen sword. "Samehada is the sword of attrition. The Hoshigaki who wields any one of the seven swords can never lose a battle. It is not possible for him to have died with that sword by his side. Nor could you have won."

"What are you saying? I saw the body!" Yugito protested, trying to make sense of the madness. "How could Bee even be here if he hadn't won?"

How indeed. Yagura glanced from Bee to Samehada, trying to figure out which was the more pressing issue.

"You always were too smart for your own good, Lord Yondaime." Yagura whirled, letting Utakata press against his back, already in the midst of blowing a bubble to hold Bee. Samehada shivered, the mouth at the end opening to reveal Kisame's head, slowly growing into the Akatsuki member's body. "But then again, it was to be expected of you."

"Kisame!" Yagura snarled the same time as Roshi cursed, fist blazing to life with yonken, the lava fist, leaping at Bee. For his part, Bee merely laughed, his entire form melting away into that of White Zetsu. "We _will_ stop you, here and now."

"You're too late!" White Zetsu laughed as Kisame fully emerged from the Samehada. He dodged the attack, watching with glee as Kisame caught Roshi across the midsection with one swing of his sword. "The war has begun. You have already lost!"

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm quickly catching up to what I have written already. Gonna switch to updating this once a week (Fridays, usually) to give me time to move forward in these final chapters, and settle into the swing of writing out a chapter regularly.


	41. Patrilineal Descent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The war begins.

The lodge exploded in a flurry of flames and wind, and Kisame was loving every second of it. Cackling, he swung Samehada through the air, deflecting the incoming Kunai. Below, the flames spun and whirled, becoming a massive dragon of smoke and flame targeting the Missing-Nin.

"Haven't had this much fun in _years_!" Kisame lobbed Samehada into the air, hands clapping together as chakra molded to form the opposing water dragon jutsu. Cheeks bulged, and from his mouth came a torrent of water that twisted into a massive dragon that met its flaming twin in an explosion of heat and steam. The torrent continued, however, as Kisame spat out water bullets into the flaming ruins. They were met with pillars of earth, stretching high into the sky after the Akatsuki member.

Kisame just laughed some more, bouncing from spire to spire, catching Samehada and consuming the chakra that fed the pillars. They crumbled beneath the sword's hunger, and both sword and wielder followed into the steam.

* * *

Kakashi stood at the head of the vanguard, staring at the treeline ahead. Fingers twitched in nervous anticipation, ghosting through Hand Seals at random. High above, the sun shone bright upon the thousands deployed to the south. The silence hung heavy in the air.

"Sir?" Beside him, a blond from Kumo – Cee, he had called himself – glanced nervously from Kakashi to the forest before them. "There's been no word from HQ. Nothing is approaching."

Kakashi side-eyed the man. "You hear anything? Birds, bugs, cute little forest critters scrambling about their business?"

Cee paused, listening to the silence in the air, and shook his head. "I don't hear anything."

"Exactly." The platoon captain slowly reached into his vest, pulling out a red signal flare. "Send word back to HQ, and call up the nearest Hyuga. They're here."

Cee nodded, but Kakashi still noticed the uncertainty in his expression. "Already done, sir. But... I don't sense anything out there."

Kakashi hummed. "And what is it that you're not sensing?"

A slow click sounded in the air as the flare was uncapped. "I don't understand."

"What you aren't sensing, Cee, are those cute little forest critters. The same little critters that vanish when a predator is the area." With the cap removed, all that remained was sending a little chakra to ignite the flare. "Now, I know what you're about to ask. But sir, isn't it us that's spooked them away? Well, as much as we want that to be the case, it's not. See, all those birds you aren't hearing? They were here when we set up the bulwark."

"Kakashi-taicho." The silver-haired Shinobi turned to see Hyuga Neji approach. "You requested me?"

"Yes, well. We seem to have a noticeable absence of forest critters. Our enemy appears to be able to mask their presence. So tell me, what do your Hyuga eyes see?"

Neji didn't so much as twitch as he turned toward the forest, the veins around his eyes exploding against his skin. They had a half-second before the forest exploded into life, dozens of purple-skinned humanoids leaping into attack. Kakashi sent a twinge of chakra into the flare, tossing it at an incoming enemy and watching with satisfaction as the flare exploded in its face.

"Contact left!" Kakashi looked in the direction, seeing two Shinobi exit the forest and explode onto the battlefield. Leaping forward, Kakashi joined his platoon in battle, sending a Kunai with a trail of Explosive Tags at the two Shinobi, who didn't even try to dodge as it landed. From the dust and smoke they came, their bodies trailing ash that clung to their forms and reformed lost limbs. "Edo Tensei! Inform HQ!"

"Contact right!" The cry was immediately followed with another explosion and a similar scream of "Edo Tensei!"

Kakashi pulled two Kunai into his hands, leaping into the fray. The war had begun.

* * *

The coast was quiet, until it wasn't.

The ocean had come alive, attacking the coastal defense with a passion. Tendrils as big around as a human exploded out of the surf, writhing in the air as they absorbed the countless Kunai and Shuriken sent their way. They twisted, faces with gleaming shark smiles forming at tendrils edge, cackling as they bit down upon their prey and dragged them screaming into the still waters.

One tendril flew down onto the coast, breaking away from the sea as it collided into the earthen land, liquid splashing onto the battlefield and coalescing into a human shape. With it came hair of silver-blue, and pale skin full of long limbs. Hozuki Suigetsu found himself in the midst of a war.

"Sweet, sweet chaos." Suigetsu paused, taking in the explosions of jutsu and screams. "And freedom. Freedom's nice too." Spinning in place, Suigetsu looked all around him, at the slurries of blood and saltwater that drizzled the air, and the ash and earth that followed. "...meh. I've seen better. I give this a 7.6; only thing that would make this better is–"

There was a bloodcurdling scream, and from above a figure came flying, his vibrant fire-red hair spinning about and shredding all who dared near him to pieces. He collided with the ground violently, smashing a crater into the cliff face. Dust and blood soaked the air, revealing a massive man with razor-sharp teeth and long sharpened spikes of hair. Suikazan Fuguki grinned a smile full of viscera as he descended upon the nearest Shinobi.

"Out of the way!" Suigetsu was shoved aside by a reed of a Kunoichi, wielding a rather hefty scroll as she dashed into battle against a man that the Hozuki teen would have sworn was dead. Suigetsu watched with mild interest as she unleashed a barrage of weaponry against Fuguki, only to have them be batted away by the man's squirming hair.

"Ain't you supposed to be dead?" To his right, and several tiers below, Suigetsu spotted Ameyuri Ringo, wielding the Kiba, the twin-swords, and bouncing from Shinobi to Shinobi, lightning arcing behind her as she left a trail of bodies in her wake. Above and to the right came the explosions of Shibuki, and when he glanced that way, could see the form of Munashi Jinpachi, a man Suigetsu's _knew_ to be dead. "...the hell?"

"Lil bro? Is that you?" Suigetsu twisted around, barely dodging the water bullet that had been sent after his head – and faced a ghost of the past.

"Mangetsu?" Suigetsu laughed, a dry sound lost to the clamor of battle. "Have I gone crazy or something? You– you're dead."

"Not crazy, lil bro." Mangetsu sauntered forward, a pair of scavenged swords held in each hand. "Me and the other swordsmen, we all died long ago, by the looks of you."

Suigetsu nodded, matching his brother's steps as he edged backward. "Yeah. Near a decade now."

"Well, this war? Seems the guy behind our side – that's the side with all these poser Hozuki – can summon the dead. Long story short, here I am."

"Here you are." Suigetsu agreed, keeping a sharp eye on both swords. "Sounds like Orochimaru. Always gotta be the creepiest one in the room, that guy."

Mangetsu didn't reply, too busy dashing forward, crossing the swords in his arms in a dual slash that would have bisected Suigetsu – if the younger brother hadn't fallen backwards, off the edge of the cliff tier, and into a dead fall.

 _Well_ , Suigetsu thought to himself as he splashed down onto the water, scavenging a sword of his own from among the drowned bodies. _I always did want to fight you, brother._

The next attack came from below, an upward slash combined with a side swipe. Suigetsu bent over backwards as he brought his sword into a two-handed grip and parried, sending the slash flying high while the swipe passed harmlessly above. He followed up with a stab, aiming at the artery behind the clavicle, only to be caught as both of Mangetsu's blades clapped against his own. "So slow, lil bro."

Steel sparked against steel as Mangetsu advanced, leaping forward toward the younger Hozuki. Both swords twisted and pulled, and Suigetsu's sword was rent from his grip and sent flying in the same instant that both sword-points jabbed at his heart and head both. Two palms slapped against steel as Suigetsu slapped against the blades, altering their trajectory, allowing him to pass unharmed between and send a kick to his elder brother.

"Slower, but more experienced. Didn't call me a genius back home for nothing." Suigetsu back-flipped away, just barely dodging death at Kabutowari and Akebino Jinin. The imposing man wielded the hammer-sword with a blunt dexterity as it cracked against the ocean. Suigetsu hummed in admiration. "It's just an all-stars kind of day, ain't it?"

Jinin twisted, spinning to hit the younger Hozuki when a kick sent him cracking against the cliff face, collapsing two tiers atop him. Kabutowari spun from its' rope as Mangetsu twirled it between his fingers. "Looking a little pale, lil bro. What's the matter, eel got your tongue?"

Suigetsu grinned, flinging his hands in the air as he shrugged. Between the two, a stray Kunai splashed down, the Explosive Tag trailing behind it already afire and primed to blow. Suigetsu twisted, his form losing solidity as he turned into a waterspout, whirling and swirling away from the explosion that rocked the ocean and sent waves sailing every-which-way, and filled the air with mist.

From the mist, Mangetsu came flying, the rope held tight in his fist as he brought the sword edge down on the waterspout, the hammer cracking down to split it in half. Saltwater rained down, diluting the mist and revealing naught but air within. Above and behind Mangetsu, Suigetsu swung the stolen sword hard, bisecting his brother where he fell.

"Well would you look at that." Suigetsu marveled at the decisive blow as he crashed into the surf, watching with satisfaction as both halves of Mangetsu splashed down into the foaming ocean. "First for everything, huh?" Suigetsu spun, blocking Kabutowari's hammer as it crashed down, aiming for his head. "Don't think I've ever seen you use a water clone, big bro. Feeling your age?"

"Youth begets pride, lil bro. Thought I already taught you that." A flick of the wrist, and the sword-edge of Kabutowari came swinging up from behind, slicing through Suigetsu's head like it was water. A half-second later, the decapitated Hozuki lost form, water slapping into the surf. The sword clattered into the water, which exploded upwards in the facsimile of a giant dragon, cracking Mangetsu into the cliff.

"Pride before the fall, big bro." Suigetsu's chuckled, swinging the sword over his shoulder. He glanced over at the other battles, and noted with satisfaction that the nearest interesting one was Ringo Ameyuri. "Think I'll come back for Kabutowari when things have settled down. This buffet table has all my favorite swords."

"Ambitious, lil bro." Kabutowari cracked down, shattering the katana in Suigetsu's hands as it sliced into the younger Hozuki. "But how you gonna do that when I've killed you dead?"

Suigetsu turned his head, looking at Mangetsu in surprise as he was cleaved in half at the shoulder. "What?" was all he got out before he fell into the surf. Mangetsu looked at his little brother dispassionately. "Sad to see you go, lil bro, but you can't kill what's already dead."

"Oh good." Suigetsu stood, his form lacking color as the opaque liquid that made up his body oozed back together. "And here I thought all these fights were gonna be boring."

* * *

"Decapitate the foot soldiers! If you see purple skin, move to decapitate immediately! They will heal from all other wounds. I repeat: they _will_ heal from all other wou–" The voice cut off as the man shouting fell apart in a shower of blood. Kakashi crackled through the air, the Kunai in his hands alight with Raiton chakra. He came down upon the enemy, who looked like a hermit crab, complete with shell and claws, and the creature's head shattered against his onslaught. He snarled as even those that were cut in half kept fighting, pulling themselves together, their skin sewing itself back together.

"You heard the man!" His voice covered the entire battlefield, made even further by the radio he'd acquired and made quick use of. "Decapitate only! Incinerate and annihilate completely! Switch to distance fighting, pull back as many wounded as you can. Do _not_ let the Edo Tensei into mid- and close-range combat distance. Keep everything at long-rage. I repeat, do _not_ directly engage the Edo Tensei. Identification is priority! Sealing Corps is to be protected at _all_ times!"

There was a chorus of cheers in the midst of several dozen Explosive Tags going off. Kakashi slaughtered several more of the creatures before retreating himself, pulling back into the open field. Dozens upon dozens of the creatures followed suit, chasing after the platoon with a vengeance. Throwing the Kunai, he took out a good half-dozen of his pursuers, and pulled out the blue signal flare. He popped the cap, preparing to set it off.

The forest ended, giving way to flat land.

Kakashi set off the flare, tossing it high above him.

The entire forest sank into the ground, flanked by sheer walls as it became an enclosed valley.

"Raze it all!" The edges of the depression were surrounded by hundreds of Shinobi, all of them running through the same set of seals, spitting out massive pillars of flame that set the submerged forest ablaze. The air was filled with the _crackle-fwoosh_ of fire, and the keening screams of the dying creatures. Kakashi watched it all with a dead eye, nodding in satisfaction. "Good. Beat back any that try to escape. Any Edo Tensei try to escape, douse them and let the Sealing Corps do their job. If we're lucky, that was all of them. I'm not a betting man, so let's assume we aren't lucky."

To the south, the distant howl of wolves echoed in the air.

* * *

"What's our situation?" Tsunade glanced from the water globe to where Inoichi sat at the head of the comm units.

"Edo Tensei are everywhere, Lady Godaime." Inoichi canted his head. "The Seven Swordsmen are ravaging the coastline with several Shinobi harboring notable Kekkei Genkai. Pakura of Suna, Gari of Iwa, Toroi of Kumo."

"Just confirmed!" One of the comm leaders called out. "Haku of the Yuki clan, Uchiha Shisui, Kaguya Kimmimaro, and Kato Dan are among the Edo Tensei on the coastline."

"Dan?" Tsunade's heart skipped a beat, before anger set in. _How_ _ **dare**_ _Orochimaru!_

"Edo Tensei to the south, less than one kilometer from Hatake-taicho's platoon!" The other leader called out. "The Nidaime Mizukage, the Nidaime Tsuchikage, Hanzo the Salamander, Hatake Sakumo, and..." The man hesitated. "The Sandaime Raikage."

"My _father_?" Ay's fist clenched, cracking against the table. "I must go attend to this madness."

"No." Tsunade kept her eyes trained on the water globe, despite listening to Shikaku as he explained why Ay couldn't leave HQ.

"Lord Mu is unique. I must be the one to face him." Onoki stood from the table, one glance at the map enough to memorize the location of the platoon. "None other can survive."

"And me." Tsunade stood as well. "Me and Jiraiya are the only two capable of going up against the Salamander on equal footing. If he's allied with Orochimaru..."

"No, Lady Godaime." Inoichi spoke up. "Hanzo is one of the Edo Tensei."

Tsunade froze, turned to Inoichi in disbelief. "That can't be. For him to die..." She shook her head; now was not the time to reminisce. "In any event, me and the old fool are heading out. We'll lead the assault."

"Inbound message. Urgent!" Everyone turned toward the comm leader – Tenga, if Tsunade remembered right. "Hoshigaki Kisame is alive. He's engaged the Jinchuuriki in battle. The island turtle is compromised!"

"Dammit!" Ay stormed toward the door. "Hokage, Tsuchikage, head to the battlefield. I shall dispose of this Akatsuki rogue myself!"

"Allow me." Tsunade felt her lip curl in disgust as Danzo stepped into the room. He had accompanied her to the Joint Alliance HQ under the pretense of being able to aid in battlefield deployment, but none of the Kages held any illusions that there was some ulterior motive behind his actions. "These bones of mine may be aged, but they have a lot of fight left in them. Stay and lead while I retrieve the Jinchuuriki safely back here."

"Why should we trust you, Shinobi of Darkness? Deceit is in your blood." Ay jabbed an accusing fist at the elder man. "What proof have you that we should trust your participation?"

"The Akatsuki is no friend of mine." Danzo stood firm. "Far less so, Orochimaru. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Or my ally, at the very least."

"We share a common enemy, so we're allies, is that it?" Danzo met the hard stare fixed at him, and nodded.

"Is that not how this Joint Alliance formed? A common enemy makes friends of even the most bitter enmity." Danzo turned, moving to leave. "Moreover, my age decries my experience. Of the two of us, I am less likely to lose this battle."

"You imply the Jinchuuriki will not win?"

Danzo scoffed at Ay. "They are ill-suited against a Hoshigaki wielder of the Samehada, if the legends are true. It will require a deft hand in his death."

At stared a moment longer, before nodding his assent. "Go. Bring them back. I will be listening in on your actions."

* * *

The ocean churned and frothed beneath them, reflecting the chaos of the war above. Suigetsu dashed and danced across its surface, spinning and whirling around his brother, dodging Kabutowari as it twisted and cut through the air. It spun by the rope, twirling around the wrist of Mangetsu as he chased after his younger brother.

"Fleeing from a battle? That doesn't seem like you, lil bro." Suigetsu looked back, and then back at the land around him. Nearby, he could hear the crackle-boom of the twin-sword Kiba.

"Nah. Not fleeing." Suigetsu clapped his hands together, drawing his chakra into the ocean and sending out a pillar of water, slamming into Mangetsu and sending him into the path of Ameyuri and her swords. He watched with not a small amount of satisfaction as Kabutowari went flying from Mangetsu's grip and his brother was electrocuted. "Just using the chaos to my advantage. How's that feel, big bro?"

Mangetsu laid in the rubble, unmoving, in the wake of the attack. Ameyuri didn't even flinch as she continued on her way. Suigetsu hummed in contentment, watching as a pair of Shinobi – from Suna, by the looks of their garb – approached the fallen Hozuki. One of them held a massive scroll of cloth, which unraveled and flew out to coil around Mangetsu's prone body.

The cloth ripped to shreds in a crackle-boom of lightning, Mangetsu wildly cackling as he burst into motion. Both Suna Shinobi fell in a shower of blood, but Suigetsu was already in motion. Mangetsu trailed after, both of them chasing after the same person: Ameyuri. It was a race, to get the other half of the Kiba, to outrun Mangetsu before he could defeat Suigetsu.

Suigetsu skated across the frothing ocean, amassing the water beneath his feet to give him more speed. From his left was the crackle-boom of lightning, and Suigetsu was forced to dodge the lance of electricity sent after him. He twisted, sending a spear of water back at Mangetsu, not even stopping to see whether it connected or not.

Ameyuri was close, far closer than she had been before, as she carved a swath of death on the beach – _towards_ both Hozuki brothers. Suigetsu dissolved into liquid to increase his speed, sending out a tidal wave to forestall Mangetsu long enough for the younger Hozuki to make landfall. He spun in the surf, reforming as he slammed into the blind area of Ameyuri, directly behind her. She went flying, lost as Suigetsu slipped her grip from the sword, stealing it away to block against Mangetsu's assault.

The attack came from above.

The air sparked and crackled, and Suigetsu held his half of the Kiba in a block over his head. Both halves collided in a _snap-boom_ of lightning, electrifying the atmosphere and knocking down anyone within ten meters of their battle. Suigetsu held his ground, both hands gripping the hilt of his blade while Mangetsu pushed against him with the other, the twin halves screaming their displeasure at being turned against one another. Lighting arced against lightning, setting the ocean beneath their feet into a roiling boil.

Suigetsu made the first move out of the stalemate, spinning on the heel and balls of his feet so his back was flush against Mangetsu's own. He matched Mangetsu's retaliation with his own, their halves of the Kiba clashing and screaming again and again as they remained in place, back to back. Upper left, lower right, above, to the side, again and again the clashes were blocked, the two brothers locked once more in a stalemate.

"You got good, little bro. Sorry to have to do this to you." Mangetsu's foot slid around Suigetsu's own, twisting and yanking and sending the younger Hozuki into a forward fall. Mangetsu twisted his sword to strike – and found the sword stalled. His eyes trailed from Suigetsu's fallen form to the sword in his hand, the hooks of the blades locked together. A single yank, and the two halves were separated once more. "Sly, little brother. But too little, too late."

Suigetsu grinned, shrugging his shoulders in a 'what can you do' expression. "Eh, thought I'd give it a try."

The sword swung up, stabbing into the elder brother's gut. Mangetsu was caught, trapped by Suigetsu's stab. Electricity sparked and buzzed throughout the elder Hozuki's body, freezing him in place. "The fuck did you do?"

"You talk too much." Suigetsu stood, lazily reaching out and taking the other half of the Kiba out of Mangetsu's frozen hand, locking together with its other half. In his other hand was the plain katana that had felled the elder Hozuki, buzzing with Raiton Chakra. "Plus, with all these swords scattered around, do you really think it wouldn't be that hard to beat you? I mean, it doesn't take much to just pick one up and take advantage of Kiba's specialty."

"The lightning affinity." Mangetsu would have nodded if he could. Nearby, the sound of fluttering cloth was loud in the air. "Damn, little bro. You beat me. What now?"

"Now?" Suigetsu looked around them, at the various battles up and down the coast. "Now you've made collecting the swords easy. Might stick around after, kick up a little more chaos. I mean, these guys are fighting Orochimaru, and that's something I can get behind any day. I'm on my own side, so don't expect me to take special care with your side."

"Thank you." The Suna-nin nodded at Suigetsu, who was watching as she sealed away his brother. "I don't know how we would have taken him down if you weren't there."

"Didn't you hear me just now?" Suigetsu gave her a bland look, which she returned. "Look, just don't get in my way, and I'll clean up this mess with the Swordsmen. Always wanted to kick the asses of the most dangerous generation."

* * *

 

Kakashi stood with his back to the assembled field medical trauma unit, watching the burning embers of the firepit dance in the air. He and the remaining survivors of his platoon were settling back against the rearguard, in the open plains where they could see for kilometers in every direction. The fire that had consumed the forest had long since ended, and underneath the ashes could be found the dead bodies of the creatures.

 _Not creatures; people_ , Kakashi reminded himself. What had attacked them had been people, once. Ordinary people that Orochimaru had experimented on, corrupted until those creatures were what was left.

A wolf, all white-light and buzzing in the air, exploded over the edge of the firepit, snarling and screaming. Kakashi acted on instinct, automatically flinging a Kunai with an attached Explosive Tag where his Sharingan knew the wolf would go. The Kunai passed through the wolf, sparking and fizzling where the lightning has encased it – and the Explosive Tag was ash, crumbling in place. All these details were recorded by the Sharingan even as the wolf exploded in a pillar of lightning, carving a dent into the ground.

The entire exchange took three seconds, if that.

"Taicho?" A Nara – one of Naruto's age-mates, Shikamaru – watched the fading smoke from the explosion with increasing wariness. "What did you spot? It was too fast to see."

Kakashi looked from the smoking crater to Shikamaru. Truth be told, Kakashi wasn't sure himself, but it was... a half-forgotten memory. Of something. He clicked on the mobile comm strapped to his back. "The second wave has arrived."

"More of them?" Shikamaru tensed, crouching low for immediate attack. "Those purple monsters?"

"No." Kakashi looked over at Neji, who nodded in confirmation. "Edo Tensei."

Shikamaru cursed – and rightly so. The Edo Tensei they had encountered had all been of a level with the Kage – yet none of them had ventured too close to directly engage. "What are they waiting for?"

"I don't know." Usually the enemy didn't announce their position on the battlefield with the exception of two things – a trap, or a distraction. Something about the wolf nagged at the back of his mind. "But it can't be good."

Three more wolves appeared, and Kakashi dispatched them in the same manner. Again he felt a faint sense of nostalgia, slithering and settling on the edge of his stomach. The hair on the back of his neck buzzed in nervous anticipation.

Seven wolves – actual, real wolves – exploded out of the earth, snarling and ripping through Shinobi. Behind them trailed seven of the lightning wolves. Kakashi's Sharingan spotted that the real wolves vanished in a plume of smoke in the second before the lightning wolves exploded. "Contact forward!" was shouted, and he spun to see a man wielding two swords encased in lightning. The swords danced in the air, slicing and slashing and cutting through everything they met. Kakashi's hands flipped through Hand Seals, and the Chidori exploded into life in his hands. "Shikamaru! Gonna need to borrow your shadow for this."

The man – of equal height with Kakashi, and sporting hair of the same silver-white color – danced from foot to foot, the two swords in his hands spinning together, their broad edges deflecting the Kunai and Shuriken sent after him. A Shinobi, wielding a massive broadsword, moved to strike with a downward slash at the Edo Tensei. The man, instead of dodging, sidestepped, letting the side of the blade pass in parallel to his back. Both of his swords came together, their forms shifting and warping into a longer broadsword, and in a single slice, the new sword dug into and through the attacking Shinobi, and the Shinobi's body was halved. Both parts fell to the ground in a splatter of gore, and the man didn't so much as twitch when it splashed back at him.

Kakashi felt Shikamaru's shadow tie into his own, and leaped at the attacking Edo Tensei. Chidori screamed in his hand, crackling and snapping and chirping in the dry air. High above, the darkening sky rumbled with thunder.

Chidori met with sword in a clash of squealing, the swords – made entirely out of water, now that Kakashi was close – encased in Raiton Chakra. Sharingan eye met dark gray, and the Genjut–

The earth exploded upwards beneath Kakashi's feet, a stone pillar that separated him from his opponent. The feeling of nostalgia vanished suddenly, leaving in its place a gaping sense of horror. "Father."

Hatake Sakumo appeared atop the stone pillar he'd made, free from both Kakashi's Genjutsu and the Shadow Possession that was intended to stop him. The sun had been blocked out by the gathering clouds, and Kakashi felt Shikamaru's shadow fading away at his feet, the control the Chunin had over his movements loosening even further. Here in the gloom, the world cast no shadows.

There was a flicker of movement, and Kakashi dodged the water sword that had been sent at him. He kept his Sharingan eye trained on the elder Hatake, noting the man's movements and chakra manipulations and planning potential countermeasures. His father would not be defeated so easily.

Hatake Sakumo had been touted as a Shinobi stronger even than the fabled Sannin; the only one, it was said, to have ever gone toe-to-toe with Hanzo the Salamander and stand victorious afterward. That victory, of course, is what had led to the Third Great Shinobi World War – a covert ops mission gone wrong, with Sakumo tasked with extraction of a deep-cover agent; he was to go in with a small team, and determine if it were possible to safely extract the Shinobi with minimal involvement. Once there, Sakumo and his team found the deep-cover Shinobi was too-well guarded – only after proceeding with the extraction. Separated from his team, Sakumo had the Shinobi in hand and was well-prepared to leave, but his team had been compromised, discovered and threatened with death. Faced with a choice of completing the mission or saving his comrades, Sakumo had chosen to save his team. The events of that failed mission had caused a breakdown in peace treaties, sending the Elemental Nations spiraling into the Third Shinobi World War. Sakumo was blamed for the war and, in reclaiming his lost honor and integrity, took his own life.

Kakashi had been five years old at the time.

Now, twenty-six years later, Kakashi was being confronted with the ghost of his father yet again.

Hand Seals flew across his fingers, charging and molding chakra into the desired jutsu. Kakashi kicked at the stone pillar, letting the jutsu loose. The effect was immediate; stone melted into mud, losing stability and sending the pillar collapsing down upon itself. It was an unconventional, if useful, variance upon the Yomi Numa jutsu.

Sakumo jumped from the melting pillar, his hands running through an array of Hand Seals that Kakashi knew all too well. Both palms lit up in Raiton Chakra, and from them bolts of lightning shot out into the battlefield, forming the explosive wolves that had started this battle. Kakashi sent Kunai and Shuriken flying after each of them, all of the targets taken out before they could hit the ground, exploding harmlessly in the air.

Then the lightning bolt struck, fired from Sakumo's fingertips – the Raiton bullet, a novice jutsu taken to deadly extremes.

Kakashi built up and discharged his second hand with Raiton Chakra, catching the bolt and redirecting it into open sky. The next lightning bolt was faster, but Kakashi caught it with one hand, letting the lightning flow from one arm and out the other, this time directed at his father. Sakumo dodged, spinning sideways out of the way and sending two lightning bolts at Kakashi as he landed on the ground. Those two were followed up with two more, as Sakumo moved laterally, running towards where the field trauma unit was set up.

Unable to redirect the four bolts, Kakashi was left having to disperse the attacks with both hands, feeling the fabric of his gloves and sleeves getting ripped to shreds. High above, the clouds rumbled and crackled with energy, and Kakashi's fingers twitched with electricity. He leapt into the air, hands running through a familiar set of Hand Seals as he trailed after his father's undead corpse.

Sakumo had reformed his twin water swords, and was well on his way to the defensive wall set up around the field trauma unit when the fireball hit. The swords reformed into a shield, but he was still pushed back by the force of the attack. When the flames dissipated, Kakashi was crouched before him, fingertips pinched in front of his mouth. "Wasn't it you that taught me never to run from my opponent?"

Sakumo said nothing, not even acknowledging that he was standing before his son, as the shield turned back into the twin swords once more. He lunged, one sword swiping high while the other swept low, forcing Kakashi to have to move back, pushing them closer to the field trauma unit. The younger Hatake could feel Shikamaru's hold on his shadow weakening, and knew that they had only one chance at this.

The Chidori screamed to life in his hand, and with a single swipe the twin swords were cut in half. A lunge of his own had his fist embedded in his father's chest – with two water daggers formed and at the ready to stab into his stomach. The Shadow Possession took, but it could barely hold, Kakashi knew. The storm had erased all their shadows, and it was tasking enough for Shikamaru to stretch his shadow such a far distance already.

Jumping backwards, Kakashi was barely able to escape injury from the daggers as the Shadow Possession failed. Sakumo barely gave his son a second glance as he resumed moving towards the field trauma unit. Grunting in frustration, Kakashi gave pursuit, the still-active Chidori in his hand screaming brighter and louder than before as the first vestiges of rain dripped down from the sky. The buzz of lightning was thick in the air, digging and chafing at Kakashi's skin as he ran after his father. _I will stop you!_

Once he was close enough, Kakashi jumped high, raising his arm to split his father in half – then they could Seal Sakumo away while he was still recovering – and the boom of lightning was loud and sharp in the atmosphere. The Chidori in his hand seemed to take on a life of its own as he dropped down, bringing his lightning-charged palm down against his father.

Lightning flashed, turning the world into a blinding white haze, and the resulting boom was deafening. Kakashi was sent flying backwards, his Sharingan recognizing what had happened before the rest of his body could even process. All the charged lightning that had been building up in the air had discharged directly onto Sakumo, following the motion of Kakashi's Chidori. Whatever was left of his father's corpse in the wake was a formless pile of ash in the midst of a massive crater carved out of the earth. In the wake of the boom of lightning, all the rainfall came collapsing down upon the battlefield, drenching everything and giving extra power to any Suiton jutsu that were being used.

The jutsu Kakashi had just used – if it could even be called that, and not a force of nature – had reformed the battlefield, turning the flat grassland into misshapen rubble, with jagged spikes of earth scattered about in the wake of the explosion.

"Taicho!" Neji stumbled toward him, looking at the crater in awe. "Taicho, what was that? The enemy was completely... eliminated."

Kakashi fell onto his back, groaning as the cool rain fell upon his overtaxed body. "Something new. Get a Sealing Corps into the crater to seal up the Edo Tensei at the center before he reforms too much, would you? I'm going to need a couple medics to look me over, if I didn't blow them away in the blast." He would be needed in the battles to come, if this was any indicator of the other battlefields. "And no, I will _not_ be doing that again. Unintentionally, at least."

 

 


	42. Shark Skin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A shark and his prey...

The mist was warm, clouding the air and obscuring all vision, perspiration welling up against the contours of his skin. He could feel them moving, trying to find his location. Their chakra buzzed against his skin, both inside and out, telltale of jutsu used and unused. It tasted like desperation when he breathed it in.

He smiled, lips pulling taut over teeth sharper than Kunai. Teeth better meant for rending and tearing flesh from bone became bared to the world.

This game they played was approaching conclusion.

Kisame chuckled, absentmindedly swinging Samehada in a wide arc, lazily catching the Shuriken sent after his blurred form. His skin prickled with heat, and he twisted on his heel, bending back at the knee and watching as the ball of magma flew harmlessly above him. The intense heat pricked at this skin, pulling it taut against muscle and bone. The ground trembled beneath his feet, splitting open to consume him. He jumped, avoiding the pitfall that became of the earth while tossing Samehada into the air, clapping his hands together in the snake Hand Seal. Chakra welled in his mouth, which he spit out at the pitfall in a geyser of water. The water exploded as the pitfall filled up, the earth shuddering at the changes made to it. Which was well enough, Kisame supposed – after all, he doubted the island turtle they were on enjoyed all these sudden changes to it's shell configuration.

A hand was thrust out, palm open and fingers curled in, pulling from the geyser to form a water shark with Kisame at the center. The chakra-made shark pulled forward, carrying Kisame towards the nearest individual – the Yonbi Jinchuuriki, who was well on his way to forming a fire jutsu of some sort, by the feel of the chakra. Samehada fell back into his free hand, the massive sword pulling close to his torso and legs, safely hidden within the confines of the water shark. A gout of flame came spiraling out at Kisame, and the water shark dove straight into it. The water rippled all along the shark's 'skin', warming at the heat but not reduced to boiling – the surrounding chakra was within Samehada's range, and thus consumed by the sword.

In seconds he was upon the Yonbi Jinchuuriki, the flames guttering out as the water shark exploded outwards, enshrouding the area in a thick mist. The Jinchuuriki was startled at Kisame's appearance, hands moving to make a new Hand Seal – likely tiger, for a Katon jutsu – only to have his jaw snapped shut by Kisame's open hand. The Jinchuuriki fell backwards, flat on his back with the Akatsuki member straddling him. The Jinchuuriki's arms were knocked to the side, all of his chakra being siphoned into Samehada, and Kisame pushed his hand further against the Jinchuuriki's jaw, locking his mouth shut. "Uh, uh, uh. No more of that pesky Yoton of yours. My Samehada just hates that lava you make. Now sleep, and pray you never wake."

The Jinchuuriki's struggles became more spastic, then slowed, and finally stopped altogether. His body went limp against Kisame's grip, and the Kiri missing-nin absentmindedly made a Hand Seal, the water prison jutsu activating and encasing the fallen Jinchuuriki. Kisame pulled his hand out of the jutsu, a spout of water still attached to his hand. The spout grew and grew, taking the imposing shape of Kisame, one arm still attached to the water prison. He pulled away, the water clone nodding as it maintained its hold on the prey. _Now for these two._

Kisame twisted, Samehada spinning into a reverse grip as he blocked the Katon jutsu that was attacking – a sword of flames, which guttered out as all the chakra keeping it going was seeped away. Samehada screeed, as show of dislike for all fire natured chakra, and hastily gave the newly gotten chakra over to its wielder. The missing-nin didn't even acknowledge the increase to his chakra, instead he scanned the area for sounds and chakra. Evening out his breathing, his eyes closed as he took stock of the layout of the area.

The ground itself was pulsing with a primal chakra, the result of being the shell of an island turtle. Occasionally there would be bursts of other chakra, one more earthen in taste, that Kisame recognized as coming from the Nanabi Jinchuuriki. She was positioned at 11 o'clock, no more than sixty meters out, with her ground at a twenty-degree higher angle than where he was. Beside her was the acidic chakra of the Gobi Jinchuuriki – and he would have to remain apprised of their location and chakra use. Together, they made a formidable enemy, one that made the fight considerably more enjoyable. At 5 o'clock, thirty meters out, 82 degree angle higher than Kisame – hiding out up a tree no doubt – was the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki. He could taste the sharp bite of its wind nature chakra, with the firey aftertaste that he'd come to recognize as being the Kyuubi. It was alone, but the Sanbi Jinchuuriki was moving towards it from another fifteen meters out, the familiar taste of the Yondaime Mizukage bringing forth memories of a bloodier time in Kisame's life. He was a higher priority than the others, and would have to be taken out last – a disadvantage for the Kiri missing-nin, as the Yondaime was rather skillful at turning the battlefield to his advantage given the chance – due to the likelihood of him finding the other Jinchuuriki and creating a plan against Kisame. At 2 o'clock, well over eighty meters out, and at an impressive 84 degree height relative to Kisame, was the arid chakra of the Ichibi Jinchuuriki. It was a wise course of action, as the Ichibi was the weakest of the Biju, and would need to preserve its chakra for as long as possible. Lastly, at 12 o'clock, ten meters out and closing, were the necrotic chakra of the Nibi and the corrosive chakra of the Rokubi Jinchuurikis, respectively.

The Nibi Jinchuuriki was the closest, and Kisame shifted to face her as she came charging out at him, his eyes remaining closed; vision was an extraneous part of the battle, where Kisame was concerned. The Nibi Jinchuuriki was wielding a sword of flames, which Kisame parried away, Samehada consuming the Katon chakra that made up the sword. "You directly engage your enemy without a plan to counter his abilities? I expected better."

The Rokubi Jinchuuriki remained ten meters out, his chakra roiling in anticipation of a jutsu that he did not dare unleash with another Jinchuuriki so close to his target. The Nibi Jinchuuriki reformed her sword, this time going in for a two-handed slash at Kisame's head. He bent backwards, switching to a normal grip with Samehada and swinging it directly into the Jinchuuriki. In her haste to make her attack contact with him, she had left herself open for the most direct attack, and Samehada struck her in the stomach, pulling and chewing at her chakra. The Nibi Jinchuuriki fell backwards, skidding along the ground and landing in a heap. Kisame straightened up, waiting for her to get back up, or reveal herself as a clone of some sort, but nothing happened. Kisame looked from her to Samehada, bemoaning how she could have put up a bit more of a fight, when the Rokubi Jinchuuriki sprang into action.

All the pent up chakra that he'd been building was released through his mouth and into the air, creating spheres that dispersed all around Kisame. They circled the Akatsuki member, seeming to encase him, when one of the bubbles popped. It exploded with a concussive force, detonating all the other bubbles and creating a chain reaction, all of them sending the force of a hard hit to anyone in the area of their detonation – and Kisame was the only one in the area. He was batted all along the battlefield, and from the way the ground shuddered, the island turtle was also hurt from the onslaught. The air rippled with concussive force, and Kisame felt his ears pop from the thrum of the island turtle's cry. The mist around him rippled, but the chakra creating it prevented dissipation.

The exploding bubbles had no such bounds, and the jutsu quickly became unbound. Kisame was left laying on the ground, mild burns dotting his skin. He sat up, looking at the Rokubi Jinchuuriki interestedly. "Now that was reckless of you."

Standing up, Kisame's grip on Samehada tightened, and he felt the rush of chakra that healed his burns. He knew how the Rokubi Jinchuuriki worked, maintaining a distance between himself and his opponent while the acid justu did all the work for him. Bracing a hand against the earth, the missing-nin sprang into action, moving to close the distance between the two of them. He rushed through the air, intent on taking out his prey, when the Gobi Jinchuuriki slammed into the earth before him.

Kisame crashed into the armored Jinchuuriki, feeling the steadfast way that it would not yield, and felt his skin sizzle from the corrosive steam. He bounced back, putting a distance between himself and the Gobi Jinchuuriki, keeping a careful eye on the Jinchuuriki's chakra while reevaluating the locations of the other Jinchuuriki. _So it's just him..._

The armored Jinchuuriki held his ground, standing as a barrier between Kisame and the Rokubi Jinchuuriki. Steam hissed out of the apparatus on his back, and the armor plates shifted as the Jinchuuriki crouched low. Kisame bared his teeth in a savage grin as he clapped his hands together, running through Hand Seals for a liquefaction jutsu. Thrusting an arm out, the Jinchuuriki's armor shuddered and screeched as all the steam within it turned to water, and the Gobi Jinchuuriki was frozen on the spot. Darting forward once more, Kisame brought Samehada down hard against the Jinchuuriki, consuming his chakra while incapacitating him. The armor buckled, and Kisame spun on his heel to defend against the Rokubi Jinchuuriki's attack.

Senbon clattered against Samehada while Kisame formed half a Hand Seal, a water clone forming from the liquid seeping out of the ruined armor. While the clone encased the Gobi Jinchuuriki in a water prison, the Akatsuki member engaged the Rokubi Jinchuuriki in combat. Senbon flew through the air, deflected by Samehada, and Kisame sent back bursts of water. The duo battled from a distance, the Rokubi Jinchuuriki occasionally sending out volleys of acid, which were in turn sent back in the form of water sharks.

The Rokubi Jinchuuriki was smart, Kisame knew, and familiar with both himself and his sword. It made the battle so much sweeter, the blood in the air so much more satisfying, as Kisame nicked his tongue, blood welling up in his mouth even as the cut healed itself. He spat into his hand, a glob of blood that coated his palm and dripped along the webbing between his fingers, and slapped his hand against the surface of the water, palm down. The water beneath him shifted, displaced by the shark he'd summoned. It circled beneath him, before the Rokubi Jinchuuriki landed on the surface of the water seven meters out.

The shark sped towards its target, and Kisame went for a distraction as he clapped his hands together, flying through Hand Seals as water welled up in his mouth, bursting out in a volley of sharp javelins that the Jinchuuriki melted with opposing attacks of acid. Steam filled the air, obscuring the Jinchuuriki's view of Kisame – while giving the missing-nin the opening he needed.

Two water clones, each with their own facsimile of Samehada, formed out of the water, while the original slipped beneath the surface. The clones separated, launching their own attacks, while the real Kisame sped toward the area directly beneath the distracted Jinchuuriki. Chakra built up in both hands, wrists pressed against each other and palms open. Fingertips curled in, giving the appearance of teeth surrounding an open mouth. Water welled up around him, turning into a giant shark that was launched up at the Jinchuuriki.

Kisame grinned wide as he felt the Rokubi Jinchuuriki's chakra get pulled into the absorbing shark, felt his own chakra get pulled into it as the two clones were dispersed, and the strength and energy renewing itself in him, making every cell in his body tingle in unspent energy.

The Rokubi Jinchuuriki fell, defeated, and was caught by another water clone. He surveyed his work with a slight grin, taking stock of where the remaining three–

A blur flitted across his vision, and Kisame's head lolled to the side. Blood spilled out onto his chest, and black spots grew in his vision as he realized that his throat had just been torn out. His grin widened further, white teeth now heavily stained with blood burbling out onto his face, as Samehada started to merge into his body, feeding him chakra, converting it into pure regenerative power that grew back the missing muscles, ligaments, arteries and veins. He coughed as his larynx and epiglottis were regrown, spat out globs of blood mixed with mucus while his lungs cleared, and righted his head again.

"What are you?" The Nibi Jinchuuriki – and wasn't that something, he mused, that it was the cat that played possum and not the tanuki or fox – faltered, giving Kisame the opening to lunge forward, hitting her with the broad side of Samehada. She flew back, and Kisame followed, keeping Samehada pressed against her. A water clone formed out of the water, catching the Nibi Jinchuuriki and stopping her, falling apart and reforming into a water prison while another water clone held the jutsu in place.

Kisame rolled his head, working out the regenerated muscles, and gave the fallen Jinchuuriki a respectful smile. "Now that was good fun. But... the fun's over. Down to business for those last three."

He extended an arm, letting the handle of Samehada crawl along his skin, slipping into it and him. He grew, the cloak twisting and ripping until it tore away. A tail, sharp and swift, grew out of the base of his back, ripping through the back of his pants, while his arm bands where similarly disposed of as his arms turned into wing-like fins, elbows jutting out and shaped like shark teeth. A dorsal fin grew along his head, out along his back, hunching him over. This was the water prison shark dance.

The ocean of water pulled toward him, converging in a giant dome that was brimming with his chakra. Kisame breathed in, tasting the four defeated Jinchuuriki while taking note of where the remaining ones were.

He moved, gliding through the water toward the most pressing threat – the Mizukage. The Sanbi Jinchuuriki had always been adept, and was on the move already. Kisame tracked as the former Mizukage moved toward the Ichibi Jinchuuriki, while the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki was already starting to stir.

It didn't take much to overtake the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki, circling and striking from all sides, the perfect dance of a predator, until Kisame's target was limp in the water. The Kyuubi's chakra was sizzling, and Kisame enjoyed the rush from the sheer power he'd consumed. Everything seemed much slower, or he seemed much faster, as he sped toward the Mizukage.

Kisame slammed into the Sanbi Jinchuuriki with all the force of a speeding Kunai through solid rock, stopping the Jinchuuriki in his tracks while pulling away the cloak of chakra that had expanded to cover the Ichibi Jinchuuriki as well. The former Mizukage reached for his hook-staff, but Kisame was too fast in the dance, hooking one arm-fin around the Ichibi Jinchuuriki and draining it as much he could while separating it from the former Mizukage. The Sanbi Jinchuuriki was sent backward, left chasing after Kisame. The chakra cloak started to reappear, but it was much fainter. "Give him up!"

"The prey chasing the predator? Now that's something you don't see every day." Kisame cackled as he let go of the Ichibi Jinchuuriki, turning to ram the oncoming Sanbi Jinchuuriki. "But... the prey is still food for the predator, in the end."

The dance ended, the water falling away and dissipating into the air, and Kisame stood victor with eight Jinchuuriki laying about him. He hummed a jaunty tune to himself as Zetsu appeared out of the trees, having taken back his form as the Hachibi Jinchuuriki. "You dance well."

"Is that you speaking, or Lord Mizukage Emeritus?" Kisame made a gesture. "There's someone coming, an enemy. Best maintain that cover of yours. Wouldn't want anyone to realize the trick before we want them to."

Zetsu grinned, moving to join the fallen Jinchuuriki. "There's a reason I like you."

"Shut up and fake being nearly dead." Kisame looked over the group, pulling out a length of rope to tie up Zetsu first. He had some time yet, the new chakra sources were still a ways away. "You know, this was one of the more exciting battles I've ever had. Shame we have to ki–"

* * *

Danzo watched as Hoshigaki Kisame's head bounced across the ground, his body falling to the side. "Burn the body, but keep the head. Mind the sword, that has great bargaining value."

Torune and Sai didn't nod, each separating to dispose of the evidence. Torune removed his gloves, his skin darkening as he laid both hands on the body. From where his skin touched, Kisame's own began to blacken and bubble, consumed by the nanobugs. Sai, meanwhile, was Sealing away the Akatsuki member's head, taking care not to touch the sword.

Danzo stood over the fallen Jinchuuriki, appraising the situation. He'd hoped to have put the Genjutsu suggestion he'd placed on Uzumaki Naruto to good use, but it seemed that fate had shined greater on him than ever before. With the Jinchuuriki down, it wouldn't take much to alter their thoughts, far less than it would have been had they not gotten their chakra drained. His right arm shuffled free of the robe, and he began the arduous task of removing the Seals placed upon it.

"My, aren't we busy." Danzo didn't react as Sai and Torune leapt to his defense, standing between himself and the enemy. He turned his head, staring at the masked man with thinly-veiled hatred. "And how about that arm of yours?"

"How did you get here?" The island was protected from all known teleportation jutsu, save perhaps the Yondaime's own Flying Raijin.

"Now that's no way to greet an old colleague." Madara shifted, and a coffin began to rise out of the ground. "Is this how you're going to greet _him_?"

The coffin stopped, upright, and the lid began to fall away. Danzo sucked in a sharp breath, considered how this information was relevant to the war, and how likely it was that he could survive.

The latter held much steeper odds than the former.

He had to get Sai away from here, instruct the boy to send a message of this to the Allied Shinobi Headquarters, while he took care of these two loose ends.

A pale hand reached around the lid of the coffin, dark hair covering and equally pale face. One yellow iris shone bright against black sclera, while the other eye held a Sharingan, the red also bright against the black.

"This certainly is... _fascinating_." Orochimaru purred, stepping away from the coffin. Cracks lined his face as the edges of his lips curved upwards in a smirk. "To be brought back from the dead as an Edo Tensei... just to fight an old experiment of mine? Oh, this just gives me shivers."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...ending with a plot twist I've been planning for a long time.


	43. Playback

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danzo learns just what an undead Orochimaru is capable of.

There was stillness, a stiffness in the fluidity of his movements. He considered the dullness of his senses, the lack of instinct nagging at the back of his neck, the lack of anticipation on the edges of his tongue.

Undeath was not all that it had seemed, Orochimaru mused, staring in fascination as his fingers flexed, one after the other. Although he had gotten use of his arms back, he could no longer feel the blood pumping beneath his skin, nor feel the taste of blood in the air when he licked his lips.

"Orochimaru." Danzo's voice brought the Sannin's attention to the elder man, and Orochimaru saw lines of age on his face that hadn't been there before. It was... interesting to note. He wondered how the arm was doing, faintly seeing the twisted chakra of it underneath – ah. Seals. "You are Edo Tensei."

"So it appears." He looked around, spotted nine figures laying on the ground behind him. For eight of them, their chakra was muted. Exhaustion, perhaps, or... "Kisame's doing. And is that the little fox? He's grown up handsome. Like his father, wouldn't you say?"

Orochimaru saw the attack coming. Danzo kicked at Samehada, sending the sword flying toward the undead Shinobi, while flipping through Hand Seals. He saw every curve and spin the greatsword made in the air, saw how it would hit him dead center in the chest.

Twisting on his feet, Orochimaru caught Samehada by the handle, using the momentum to turn and send it back at the man. He saw as much as felt the sword consume at his chakra, trying to weaken him, and he couldn't help but laugh.

Even in death, he had won. Whoever had summoned him – and by the feel of the chakra, it must have been Zetsu, because how else could he summon his own dead body – had implanted the Sharingan into him. An empty victory, perhaps, but he could consider that at a later time.

Now he had to dodge Danzo, the Seals on his right arm falling away to reveal the gnarled wood-like arm covered in Sharingan. The elder man was behind him, not in front, a Kunai in his right hand while the left had what appeared to be a Cursed Seal of Paralysis prepared.

Orochimaru kicked back, the heel of his foot knocking the Kunai out of Danzo's grip while using his chakra to grab onto it and repel the weapon away, stabbing Danzo in the man's right shoulder. He also grabbed at the man's left wrist, squeezing and feeling the bones snap and crack. Pulling his outstretched leg back in, He also aimed a hard kick at the elder man's right knee, intent on shattering it as well.

Danzo's form vanished, fading into nothing. Orochimaru narrowed his eyes in annoyance, whirling to bat away the outstretched left arm of the uninjured Danzo, fingers again curling at the wrist while his free hand punched at the elbow, breaking the arm at the joint. For good measure, he also kicked at the shoulder, dislocating it.

Again Danzo vanished into nothing. Well then. Orochimaru was starting to feel like he was being toyed with. It was a novel feeling. "Izanagi? And here I thought old dogs couldn't learn new tricks."

They clashed, Danzo holding the upper hand as Orochimaru kept track of the left arm, making sure the hand didn't touch him. That time, Danzo managed to slice the undead Sannin clear in half, and had almost succeeded in applying the Cursed Seal – only have to dodge Kusanagi as it tried to cleave off his head.

Orochimaru watched one of the Sharingan on Danzo's arm close, and mentally calculated the time elapsed. "One minute per eye? How succulent."

"Still as impertinent a brat as ever, even in death." Danzo leapt back to avoid the slash from Kusanagi, flinging a pair of Kunai in retaliation. Orochimaru cut through them like butter, extending his left arm. Out of his sleeve dozens of dark purple snakes struck, aiming to incapacitate the elder man. Danzo brought his hands together in the Snake Hand Seal, and exhaled a crescent of wind that sliced the attacking snakes into pieces. "And imprudent."

He advanced, left arm extended to hit Orochimaru, only to have it sliced off and himself cut into. The snake Sannin smirked, rotating his wrist and cutting off the other arm, midway between elbow and shoulder.

Danzo's body vanished, the man reappearing by Kisame's corpse. He made the Rat Hand Seal, and Orochimaru watched as the man's chakra settled. The former ROOT leader certainly was smart. "Releasing Izanagi already? And you call me imprudent, when you can't even keep it up."

"You think I need waste these precious eyes on you?" Danzo pulled out another Kunai, drawing a thin line of red along the outside of his left forearm. Swiping his thumb along the cut, Danzo slapped his hand on the ground, summoning a huge beast – a Baku, Orochimaru recognized as he leaped back.

Beneath the Baku, the nine fallen Jinchuuriki lay. To the side, Orochimaru could sense Tobi lingering at the edges of the battlefield.

The Baku opened its' mouth, and inhaled. Orochimaru watched with fascination as it created a vacuum, air escaping out of the long trunk while the mouth consumed everything that was pulled in – dirt, trees, even Kisame's body. The snake Sannin could feel the ashes of his body peel away, pulled in by the vacuum, and considered what would be best to stop the summons.

He noticed almost too late that Danzo was behind him, sending a volley of Futon jutsu to destroy his footing, and used Kusanagi to retaliate with a slice of his own. The jutsu dug furrows in the ground around him, loose pieces of earth getting caught in the suction. "Impressive suction. Trying to blow me down?" He chuckled, hands coming together in the Tiger Hand Seal. "You're sucking too hard. I'm really a big softie for these kinds of things, but sometimes you have to explode a little early to get things done."

Orochimaru turned, letting loose the Grand Fireball jutsu, made all the larger and faster by the Baku's suction. The fireball hit the Baku's mouth, exploding and burning everything, forcing the summons to stop the attack. The snake Sannin smiled. "What's the matter? Am I too much for you that you can't swallow it all?"

The Baku huffed, preparing to open its' mouth again when a pillar of earth shot up, hitting it in the gut. The summons vanished in an explosion of smoke, and Orochimaru dodged the segments of earth that shot out after him, noticing that Danzo was already on the move, making the necessary Hand Seals as he approached the Nanabi Jinchuuriki.

The earth split open as stalagmites rose from it, the pointed tops sheared off as Danzo continued his rush toward the girl. She didn't so much as flinch when he landed in front of her, pulling on the bandages hiding his right eye. He was so focused on stopping the girl that he didn't notice when the stalagmite tips rose into the air and converged on the duo, crushing the both of them.

From beside the fallen Jinchuuriki, Orochimaru watched as a spot of ground crackled and crumbled, revealing the Nanabi Jinchuuriki, who stood straight and fixed her sight on the snake Sannin. Orochimaru considered this development, and whether he would have to fight the girl. "An impressive display, although you made quite the mess of things with that finish of yours."

Danzo reappeared behind the girl, his right eye gleaming in the shadow of the bandages as it locked onto the Jinchuuriki. She collapsed to the ground, limp, and Orochimaru took his chance. Leaping forward, he sent out another volley of dark purple snakes, sliced through the Kunai sent after him.

The elder man pulled out another Kunai, set up another Cursed Seal of Paralysis in his left hand, and sent out another gust of wind to slice the snakes to ribbons. On Danzo's right arm, a second eye closed.

Danzo moved forward, left arm extended to hit Orochimaru, only to have it sliced off and himself cut into. The snake Sannin smirked, rotating his wrist and cutting off the right arm, midway between the elbow and the shoulder.

Orochimaru's left eye faded white.

Danzo's body vanished, the man reappearing by Kisame's corpse. He made the Rat Hand Seal, and Orochimaru watched with both eyes as the man's chakra settled. "Releasing Izanagi already? And you call me imprudent, when you can't even keep it up."

"You repeat yourself." Danzo pulled out another Kunai, drawing a thin line of red along the outside of his left forearm. Swiping his thumb along the cut, Danzo slapped his hand on the ground, summoned the Baku again.

Beneath the Baku, the nine fallen Jinchuuriki lay.

The Baku opened its' mouth, and inhaled. Orochimaru watched with fascination as it created a vacuum, air escaping out of the long trunk while the mouth consumed everything that was pulled in – dirt, trees, even Kisame's body. Danzo saw as Orochimaru considered his options, and moved.

He noticed almost too late that Danzo was behind him, sending a volley of Futon jutsu to destroy his footing, and used Kusanagi to retaliate with a slice of his own. The jutsu dug furrows in the ground around him, loose pieces of earth getting caught in the suction. "Impressive suction. Trying to blow me down?" He chuckled, hands coming together in the Tiger Hand Seal. "You're sucking too hard. I'm really a big softie for these kinds of things, but sometimes you have to explode a little early to get things done."

Orochimaru turned, letting loose the Grand Fireball jutsu, made all the larger and faster by the Baku's suction. The fireball hit the Baku's mouth, exploding and burning everything, forcing the summons to stop the attack. The snake Sannin smiled. "What's the matter? Am I too much for you that you can't swallow it all?"

The Baku huffed, preparing to open its' mouth again when a pillar of earth shot up, hitting it in the gut. The summons vanished in an explosion of smoke, and Orochimaru dodged the segments of earth that shot out after him, noticing that Danzo was already on the move, a frown on his face as he made the necessary Hand Seals and approached the Nanabi Jinchuuriki.

The earth split open as stalagmites rose from it, the pointed tops sheared off as Danzo continued his rush toward the girl. She didn't so much as flinch when he landed in front of her, pulling on the bandages hiding his right eye. He was so focused on stopping the girl that he didn't notice when the stalagmite tips rose into the air and converged on the duo, crushing the both of them.

From beside the fallen Jinchuuriki, Orochimaru watched as a spot of ground crackled and crumbled, revealing the Nanabi Jinchuuriki, who stood straight and fixed her sight on the snake Sannin. Orochimaru considered this development, and whether he would have to fight the girl. "An impressive display, although you made quite the mess of things with that finish of yours."

Danzo reappeared behind the girl, his right eye gleaming in the shadow of the bandages as it locked onto the Jinchuuriki. She collapsed to the ground, limp, and Orochimaru took his chance. Leaping forward, he sent out another volley of dark purple snakes, sliced through the Kunai sent after him. Danzo's frown deepened. "I already defeated you, how did you awaken?"

The elder man pulled out another Kunai, set up another Cursed Seal of Paralysis in his left hand, and sent out another gust of wind to slice the snakes to ribbons. On Danzo's right arm, a second eye closed.

Danzo moved forward, left arm extended to hit Orochimaru, only to have it sliced off and himself cut into. The snake Sannin smirked, rotating his wrist and cutting off the right arm, midway between the elbow and the shoulder.

Danzo's body vanished, the man reappearing beside Kisame's corpse. He released Izanagi, glancing down at the body in disturbed fascination. "What jutsu is this?"

Orochimaru smirked. "Releasing Izanagi already? And you call me imprudent, when you can't even keep it up."

"You've said that before." Danzo pulled out another Kunai, drawing a thin line of red along the outside of his left forearm. Swiping his thumb along the cut, Danzo slapped his hand on the ground, summoning the Baku. "You will tell me what this is."

Beneath the Baku, the nine fallen Jinchuuriki lay.

The Baku opened its' mouth, and inhaled. Orochimaru watched with fascination as it created a vacuum, air escaping out of the long trunk while the mouth consumed everything that was pulled in – dirt, trees, even Kisame's body. The snake Sannin's ashen body was peeling away, bits and pieces

He noticed almost too late that Danzo was behind him, sending a volley of Futon jutsu to destroy his footing, and used Kusanagi to retaliate with a slice of his own. The jutsu dug furrows in the ground around him, loose pieces of earth getting caught in the suction. "Impressive suction. Trying to blow me down?" He chuckled, hands coming together in the Tiger Hand Seal. "You're sucking too hard. I'm really a big softie for these kinds of things, but sometimes you have to explode a little early to get things done."

Orochimaru turned, letting loose the Grand Fireball jutsu, made all the larger and faster by the Baku's suction. The fireball hit the Baku's mouth, exploding and burning everything, forcing the summons to stop the attack. The snake Sannin smiled. "What's the matter? Am I too much for you that you can't swallow it all?"

The Baku huffed, preparing to open its' mouth again when a pillar of earth shot up, hitting it in the gut. The summons vanished in an explosion of smoke, and Orochimaru dodged the segments of earth that shot out after him, noticing that Danzo was already on the move, making the necessary Hand Seals as he approached the Nanabi Jinchuuriki. He snarled, "I have defeated you twice now! What Genjutsu is this, Orochimaru!?"

The earth split open as stalagmites rose from it, the pointed tops sheared off as Danzo continued his rush toward the girl. She didn't so much as flinch when he landed in front of her, pulling on the bandages hiding his right eye. He was so focused on stopping the girl that he didn't notice when the stalagmite tips rose into the air and converged on the duo, crushing the both of them.

From beside the fallen Jinchuuriki, Orochimaru watched as a spot of ground crackled and crumbled, revealing the Nanabi Jinchuuriki, who stood straight and fixed her sight on the snake Sannin. Orochimaru considered this development, and whether he would have to fight the girl. "An impressive display, although you made quite the mess of things with that finish of yours."

Danzo reappeared behind the girl, his right eye gleaming in the shadow of the bandages as it locked onto the Jinchuuriki. She collapsed to the ground, limp, and Orochimaru took his chance. Leaping forward, he sent out another volley of dark purple snakes, sliced through the Kunai sent after him.

The elder man pulled out another Kunai, set up another Cursed Seal of Paralysis in his left hand, and sent out another gust of wind to slice the snakes to ribbons. On Danzo's right arm, a second eye closed.

Danzo moved forward, left arm extended to hit Orochimaru, only to have it sliced off and himself cut into. The snake Sannin smirked, rotating his wrist and cutting off the right arm, midway between the elbow and the shoulder.

Danzo's body vanished, the man reappearing beside Kisame's body. He released Izanagi, a scowl on his face as he spotted that only one eye was shut on his right arm, and his left arm lacked a cut. "Orochimaru! What despicable Genjutsu have you trapped me in!?"

Everything was the same, progressed the same: the cut on his arm, the Baku, the Missing-Nin's body consumed by the vacuum, all of it exactly the same. No matter what he did, no matter how many things he adjusted for the predicted actions, everything played out the same.

Danzo moved forward, left arm extended to hit Orochimaru, only to have it sliced off and himself cut into. The snake Sannin smirked, rotating his wrist and cutting off the right arm, midway between the elbow and the shoulder.

Danzo's body vanished, the man reappearing beside Kisame's body.

Always that moment, the moment everything repeated. An endless loop. The elder man snarled, keeping Izanagi active. Perhaps this time–

Reality shifted, Kisame's body vanishing and the cut on Danzo's forearm reappearing. The Jinchuuriki girl lay at his feet, and Orochimaru was in the middle of tying her up. Danzo glanced at his right arm, spotting that two eyes were shut, and a third was closing.

Danzo twitched his fingers, striking Orochimaru in the throat with the Cursed Seal of Paralysis. He felt a moment of vicious satisfaction watching the curse take hold, freezing the undead man in place, then twinged when he realized that he had been stabbed in the heart with Kusanagi.

Well, not anymore.

He reappeared several feet to the side, releasing Izanagi as he plucked Kusanagi out of Orochimaru's frozen grip. Examining the sword, he marveled at the craftsmanship. "That was quite the Genjutsu you trapped me in. I don't believe I've encountered it before. Perhaps now you can tell me what it was."

Orochimaru stared back at him with one Sharingan eye, the other one blind. "Izanami, if you insist of getting me stiff and leaving me hanging. A counter to Izanagi, and a lesson that one mustn't turn a blind eye to one's disadvantages. After all, an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind."

"Enough of your posturing." Danzo turned away. Orochimaru was trapped, and he couldn't break free without the second eye. "Now I must kill the man who summoned you. Wait here, and think on your sins."

"Sarutobi-Sensei was right not to consider you his successor. Even he knew not to turn his back to me." Orochimaru gagged, fingers slipping out of his lips and pulling his mouth wider and wider. His ashen pale skin was clear of any curse markings as he stepped out of the shed skin. The sword in Danzo's grip squirmed and writhed, turning into a snake that fell away from the elder man's grip and slithered back to its master.

Danzo was already on the third Hand Seal and activating Izanagi when the snake Sannin struck, sword back in hand as he slashed at the elder from behind. The man split apart from shoulder to hip, but the blood that sprayed out vanished before it could hit the ground. Orochimaru whirled to parry a Kunai, and spotted a burning Explosive Tag attached to the hilt half a second before it went off.

Dirt and dust filled the air, and Danzo sent a volley of Crescent Waves into the smoke cloud from his place in the trees above, dispersing it to reveal the ashen remains of Orochimaru's arm, no longer holding Kusanagi. The sword stabbed through Danzo from behind, coated in a layer of cutting Futon chakra. On Danzo's arm, a fourth eye closed.

Orochimaru scowled, his other arm reforming from the ash. Down below, his lost arm crumbled away. "Now that was just plain rude, disarming me like that. Is our foreplay just not cutting it for you?"

Danzo vanished, and Orochimaru spun to block the Kunai thrust that was about to punch through his head. Orochimaru's left eye met Danzo's uncovered right, and the elder man snarled. "You will defend Konoha to the end of your days, Orochimaru."

The Mangekyo Sharingan spun as the Genjutsu took hold of Orochimaru. The Sannin stepped back, frowning as he lowered his sword. "Is that Shisui's eye? How naughty you are, taking things that aren't yours."

Danzo glared, blowing Futon chakra to coat the Kunai in his hand. He may have stopped the Edo Tensei's attacks, it didn't mean that he wouldn't try to kill the elder if he could. He considered dispelling Izanagi, but decided to wait until Orochimaru was on his way to the battlefield, leaving him alone to deal with Tobi. "Don't think you're old enough to chastise me, brat. Go join your old teammates in battle. I heard Hanzo is a part of this war, much the same as you."

"Now why would I do that?" Orochimaru smirked, leveling his sword at Danzo. "You ordered me to defend Konoha. What's stopping me from releasing myself, or killing you in defense of the village, hmm?"

Danzo held up his free hand, letting Orochimaru see the Cursed Seal of Paralysis waiting to take hold. "Do not test me. Leave here immedia–"

The elder's head flew from his body, cleaved off by a Kusari-gama. Both it and the body vanished, and Orochimaru fled the area as Tobi landed where Danzo once stood. He glared at the vanishing form of Orochimaru, then at the reappeared Danzo standing at the far edge of the clearing. "Damn you."

On Danzo's right arm, a fifth eye closed. Five minutes to kill the masked man, then. Simple enough.

Danzo moved, the Futon-clad Kunai in his hand cleaving through the Kusari-gama as his other hand grabbed at the chain, wrapping it around his wrist and pulling. Tobi leaped forward, twin whips of fire sparking to life in his hands as he clashed with the former ROOT leader. One whip caught on the Futon-clad Kunai, the flames growing larger and brighter, catching hold of Danzo's arm before he could toss away the weapon. The other whip latched onto Danzo's other arm, sizzling and hissing as the wood and eyes caught fire.

Again, Danzo vanished, reappearing unharmed and running past where he previously died. Tobi tracked his movements with sharp eyes, that Danzo intended to harvest to replace the lost ones on his arm.

Inhaling, he spat out wind bullets that caught fire and exploded when Tobi snapped the fire whips at them, and leaped into the resulting wall of flames. Nothing could hurt him while Izanagi was active, and it would remain so until the masked man was lying dead at his feet.

The sixth eye closed as his burning corpse fell to the ground.

He managed to reappear behind the masked man, and the Kunai he threw went through the masked man like he wasn't even there. Danzo watched as Tobi turned around, disregarding the Kunai as he moved to grab onto the elder man.

The Explosive Tags wrapped around the hilts of the Kunai went off, engulfing the area in flame. Danzo reappeared beyond the flames unscathed, and pulled out another Kunai – his last, it seemed – in preparation of another attack. A quick check of his arm showed that he still had four eyes open.

From the flames, Tobi staggered. The mask he was wearing had cracked, the lower half falling away to reveal a bleeding mouth set in a snarl. "Do not think I am so easily killed."

Danzo was already moving toward the flames, leaping into the fire to cut into the masked man even as the seventh eye closed. The mask was torn completely off, and the elder man reappeared again beyond the flames, moving to plant a Cursed Seal of Paralysis even as he saw only three eyes remained. He was winning the battle, and Tobi was going to di–

The flames spun, curling and converging into a massive phoenix, the wings outstretched as it exploded in a great flash of light. Danzo shielded his eyes but didn't stop moving. The world was counting on him to win this battle, and he couldn't rule Konoha or the world if he hesitated.

Ash fell around the duo, and Danzo was about to deliver the finishing blow, decapitating the masked man, when Tobi whirled to face him, snarling. "You lose, Shimura Danzo!"

Danzo's eye widened as he saw the unmasked face, and cursed when he checked to see that he had two eyes left open. Tobi started to laugh as he clasped hands over the little flame that floated down before him, sending the entire clearing up in flames.

Danzo reappeared at the edge of the clearing, failing to spot either the fallen Jinchuuriki or the masked man – no, not the masked man. He'd destroyed the mask, had gotten to see the man's true face.

Checking his arm, he was relieved to see that the ninth eye closed, the last Sharingan on the back of his hand still open. Good. He was going to need it if he had any chance to kill–

A figure stepped out of the flames, the broken Kusari-gama spinning in his hands, the broken blade replaced with one made of fire. He glared at Danzo, leaping to cut the elder man down. Danzo breathed Futon chakra on the Kunai in his hand, prepared to kill his opponent with this final clash.

They leaped at each other, Kusari-gama and Kunai, wind and fire, clashing in a spray of blood.

Danzo stood, ignoring the pain of the Kusari-gama lodged in him as he looked his opponent in the eyes. Izanagi was going to kick in and save him, while the other would die of his wound as the Futon-clad Kunai vanished.

He coughed up blood, feeling himself go numb, his body not vanishing, and glanced down at his right arm, all ten Sharingan eyes closed. His opponent began to laugh.

_No..._

Danzo couldn't have lost. He'd delivered a fatal blow, much the same as the other had done to him. Even if his opponent survived, Danzo still had the Seal on his body, and that would kill the man–

The Kusari-gama was yanked, dragging through Danzo and splitting him in two. The Seal on his chest faded, broken from the wounds inflicted. Danzo coughed, feeling himself dying. He had failed the Joint Alliance, failed the war, and failed Konoha. "Damn you, Uchiha Izuna."

Izuna continued to laugh, long after Danzo died. He had won.

The Jinchuuriki were his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it occurs to me that every time I write Orochimaru he's letting off more and more puns. The number of puns I wrote for him to make that didn't make it into the chapter, I swear...
> 
> And yeah, I've planned Izuna being the one behind the mask since chapter eight, and this chapter since Orochimaru squared off against Itachi in chapter twenty-one. 
> 
> I also now have less than two weeks to finish chapter 45, and get into the regular habit of writing the final five chapters.


	44. Business Unfinished

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lee meets an old opponent on the battlefield.

The air smelled so much more salty than Lee had expected. It was early in the afternoon, the war going on since early in the morning, and he had not found more than two seconds of calm to catch his breath. Kicking out, he sent another pair of the White Zetsu flying into the cliff wall, their chests crushed inward.

Explosions rumbled across the air, sending sand and seawater raining all around, and Lee kept a careful eye on his surroundings. Word had spread of Edo Tensei in the battle to the north, but he had not seen anyone with ashen skin wading out of the ocean.

Or rather, he hadn't until now. Lee spotted white hair atop an ashen gray head peering out of the water, and struck with the full might of his speed and power. He had gotten rid of his weights earlier in the battle, and was delivering a crushing kick to the Edo Tensei in the blink of an eye. The Edo Tensei looked eerily familiar as it blocked his kick, pure-white bones sticking out of torn skin. The Edo Tensei blinked in recognition as the surrounding water exploded out around him from the force of the attack. "You."

Lee brought down his other leg, only to have it blocked with the other arm, broken bones with sharpened points sticking out of it. He too recognized his opponent, pulling out a flashbomb to pull some distance between himself and this opponent. He whistled, one long burst and two sharp, the signal that he was engaged with an Edo Tensei. Nearby, a pair from the Sealing squad leaped close. The older of the two, a woman with dark skin and darker curly hair, nodded at the opponent. "Kaguya Kimmimaro, formerly one of Orochimaru's top men."

"Indeed." Lee nodded, not taking his eyes off of Kimmimaro. "I was there when he died. He is very strong, and would have won against Gaara, the Jinchuuriki of Suna. Please remain back until I am certain of his defeat."

He didn't wait for their answer, leaping forward to send another kick at Kimmimaro, only to have it blocked. Kimmimaro leveled his free hand at Lee, the tips of his fingers splitting open. Lee grabbed onto Kimmimaro's wrist, pulling himself close and pushing the hand down. The digital bullets shot out, hitting only water, and Lee punched his opponent in the throat, leaping away even as the undead Kaguya staggered back. He struck again, this time a roundhouse kick that sank halfway through Kimmimaro's torso before being blocked as bone grew out to defend against the attack.

The bandages around lee's hands came loose as he threw another punch at Kimmimaro's chest, and let the cloth get wrapped up in the ribs that grew out to stop him. Lee smirked, the bandages on his other hand unraveling and spinning to wrap around Kimmimaro as he was kicked into the air. "I don't believe I had to chance to show you this before. The Lotus is a very effective technique."

Kimmimaro found his arms pinned to his side by the bandages, and by the time his bone spikes had torn through them, he was already in the midst of the attack, spinning into the ocean and deep into the sandy bottom below. The ocean filled in the gap left by the attack, and Lee held up a hand to forestall the Sealing squad members as they moved to stop the seemingly defeated Kaguya.

The ocean exploded, and through the mist Kimmimaro leaped forward, in the second stage of his cursed mark and pulling out the spinal whip, his other arm becoming covered in a white bone gauntlet that ended in long jagged claws that used to be his fingers. Lee stood resolute, letting the Gates open within him as he pushed to the Fifth Gate. His skin burned red, and he vanished, a fist lashing out to shatter the gauntlet while the other grabbed onto the whip. "Experience the magnificent Reverse Lotus. This will be the only time you will ever see it."

He pulled on the whip, striking it against his knee and shattering it, then thrusting both legs out and through Kimmimaro's chest. Lee grabbed onto the arm that had once been a gauntlet, and pulled the undead Kaguya's arm off while snapped his legs apart, rendering Kimmimaro without a lower half of his body. Another punch, this time to Kimmimaro's face, sent the Kaguya's upper body flying toward the Sealing squad members, who worked quickly to subdue the fallen Edo Tensei before he could fully recover from his injuries.

Lee landed before them and smiled, flashing a thumbs up before the effects of opening the Gates fell upon him. He collapsed, a grin on his face, beside the Sealed Kaguya. Where once he had struggled to remain on equal footing with this opponent, now he could easily defeat such a strong Shinobi. He truly had become a splendid Shinobi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, chapter 45 will be out by the end of the week. Then, hopefully, a new chapter out every two weeks until completion.


	45. The Legendary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two Kage arrive on the battlefield as dusk approaches.

Uchiha Izuna was a name lost to history. He was a brilliant tactician, often predicting the opponent's battles and decisions long before they made them. But he was lost to history, trapped within the shadow of his older brother, and fatally wounded in battle against the Senju years before the alliance that would create Konohagakure. He died from his wounds, inflicted by Senju Tobirama, where his eyes would be transferred to his brother, the only piece of himself that history would remember.

But history was incorrect.

Izuna awakened the Mangekyo just as his brother. The powers of his right eye were relegated to space-time, allowing him to travel to and from a separate dimension, allowed him to place the jutsu upon his body and turned him intangible; wherever his body overlapped with the world around him, that overlapping part was transported, however briefly, to his dimension. His right eye was powerful, and he could maintain this bodily intangibility for up to five minutes at a time. It allowed him to stand equal to Tobirama in battle, until the moment of his death.

But the power of his left eye he kept secret, even to his brother. With it, he could transfer his consciousness into whoever was within his line of vision. It was this power that both saved and killed him.

Madara's eyes were of a different power. His left eye brought life to Nature, creating a plant body that was close to immortal. Cut it down, and it would regenerate. Let it absorb chakra, and it could impersonate the source, physically, mentally, even the chakra polarity. His right eye brought consciousness to Nature, a black creature that could attach itself to all things, consume all knowledge and share it with others. He called these powers Zetsu, and it could maintain form for extensive periods of time, separate from Madara's control, by consuming the dead.

In Izuna's dying moments, he used his left eye to transfer into the nearest White Zetsu. But he was weak, had just been _dying_ , could barely speak much less change his appearance. So he hid away, stealing a White Zetsu and Black Zetsu as his consultants. Madara had his still-dying body, and his plan was to wait until Madara did the eye transfer – upon learning Mangekyo use caused blindness, Izuna and Madara had agreed to switch their eyes upon the others death. Izuna planned to use the Izanagi, undo his death and reap the theorized benefits of swapped Sharingan.

Unfortunately, because of his weakness, he was forced watch as his body died, was forced to steal Madara's eyes from his dead body, was forced to watch as Madara made peace with Senju, created Konoha. He was forced to watch as his brother was betrayed, as Madara realized that all his dreams to create a village hadn't changed a thing. The children were safe from harm, but they were still unsafe from loss, from war. The system of hidden villages was flawed, and Madara was seeing through the cracks in the veneer.

Izuna could do little else but watch as Madara died at the hands of the man he called friend. He could not eat, could not sleep, and for the longest time could do nothing but observe.

In Madara's dying moments, Izuna appeared, taking back his eyes and returning Madara's. Madara's eyes, that changed even further, becoming gray ripples – became Rinnegan, a myth turned real. Izuna watched and reconsidered. If the Rinnegan, once considered myth, were real, then what else was real? What other myths were reality?

So he sought the Archives, digging deeper and deeper into the past, and planned. The Biju, as the world knew them, became pieces of a greater whole: the Juubi. The Juubi became a piece of a greater power, that would be awakened by a confluence of events.

The blood of an acolyte of Jashin.

The sword of a long-fallen clan: the Kusanagi.

The Juubi, whose chakra originally came from this power.

Together, they would act as a key to a lock, opening the cage to an ancient being of immense power.

But he needed time, needed to find all the pieces. First, he took Madara's eyes, transplanting them into a small child of Uzumaki lineage; the boy, Nagato, would summon the body of the Juubi, the Gedo Mazo, and provided the ability to resurrect Madara at the correct time. Then, he needed to remove the elemental Kekkei Genkai from the nations, the only ones that could upset his plans: he needed to kill the Children.

So Izuna killed the Sandaime Mizukage, took control of Tadashii Yagura, and created the Bloodline Purges. All to kill the Children.

When knowledge came to him of Uzumaki Kushina's pregnancy, his hand was forced into the open. He couldn't allow any Children, and he planned to kill the newborn child in the guise of Unsealing the Kyuubi and setting it loose in Konoha. He failed to kill the Child, but succeeded in killing Namikaze Minato – perhaps the only Shinobi in the Elemental Nations that could kill him – and in turning the Child into the Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi. It was also the first time he took on the title of his brother.

Over the years, Izuna worked with Orochimaru, creating artificial White Zetsu using Hashirama's DNA and aiding in creating the right arm of Shimura Danzo. He approached Nagato, helped craft the six paths and refine Madara's Rinnegan. And together, Akatsuki was created.

And now, after over half a century of planning, Izuna's plans were coming to fruition. He had the sword, the blood, and all the components of the Juubi. It was like the heavens were blessing him, as even the blood moon was rising over the horizon, due to eclipse that evening. He would start the Unsealing at sundown, resurrect Madara, and leave the future to his brother.

For the first time in seventy-eight years, Izuna was going to sleep.

* * *

 

The sun was beginning to hang low on the horizon. Evening was nearing, and Tsunade and Onoki were nearing the battle. They flew through the air, a by-product of Onoki's weight-altering jutsu, and even now Tsunade couldn't quite bring herself to believe that this was happening. That all five Kage would work together, bringing cooperation among all the hidden villages.

That this was, indeed, the final war.

She remembered the Second War, and the third. The Second War was when she was young, barely a teenager, and lasted well into her twenties. It was the war that cost her Nawaki. The Third War happened years later, in her late thirties and early forties. It was that war that cost her Dan.

But here, and now, it was the second war that mattered. The battle that named the Deadlands in the Land of Rain, that brought the rise of the legendary trio, the Sannin. The battle against Hanzo.

It was difficult for her to imagine how Hanzo, how that terrifying being, lost his life. He hadn't died quietly, that was for certain – the Salamander was too stubborn to have died in any way other than in battle. Which begged the question of just who killed Hanzo the Salamander. That creature from the summit, Pein? They had harbored Hitai-Ates from Amegakure, and Jiraiya later noted how all of their faces were strikingly familiar to him – but the most notable aspect had to be their eyes. The Rinnegan was not something to be taken lightly, and she doubted that it was the last the Joint Alliance was going to see of those eyes.

“ _New developments from the field!”_ Inoichi announced, tapping into the Tsuchikage and Hokage's minds. _“Responders from the barrier corps have met up with the Jinchuuriki, reviving them. Shimura Danzo is dead, along with Hoshigaki Kisame. The barrier was briefly broken through as Orochimaru and Madara were both sensed fleeing the island. Sensors have relayed that the two were in combat with one another. The Jinchuuriki are safe, however, although suffering from chakra exhaustion due to close contact with the Samehada. Commander Ay has ordered the Jinchuuriki be relocated back to HQ due to the gravely compromised nature of the island's location.”_

So Danzo was dead. Tsunade could barely believe such a thing was possible; but then, there were a lot of things that she hadn't thought possible but happened in recent days. A part of her wondered what other seemingly impossible things would happen in the coming days of this war.

Tsunade and Onoki arrived at the edges of an immensely huge pit, the aged Tsuchikage returning Tsunade's weight to normal. They met with Kakashi, who was in the middle of Sealing away the Sandaime Raikage. Off to the side was a forest, a huge patch of it cut away and sunk down into a deep pit, while on the other side was a field covered in a thick fog. The copy ninja was bleeding from a heavy wound on his side, which Tsunade wasted no time healing.

“Lady Hokage. Lord Tsuchikage.” Kakashi let out a wheezing laugh. “It seems you arrived just in time for the more fun battles. The Nidaime Mizukage–”

“We can deal with him after dispensing with Lord Mu.” Onoki interrupted, gesturing toward the forest in the far distance. “He will be the greater threat.”

“Or,” Tsunade countered, “Kakashi takes everyone and goes after the Mizukage, while us Kage take on the Nothing Man and the Salamander.” She took a look around the encampment, but failed to spot her old teammate. “Where is he, by the way?”

“That _would_ be simpler.” Kakashi stood, patting at the torn flak jacket. “However, Jiraiya has already engaged Hanzo–”

Kakashi was interrupted again, this time by a massive explosion of fire from within the pit. Tsunade cursed her idiotic teammate out, running toward the edge. The copy-ninja glanced at Onoki, relaying the last known coordinates of Mu before dashing toward the fog.

In the pit, Tsunade had to pull out one of the breathing masks the samurai kept, and made a deep crater in the ash. Smoke and gas filled the air, and Tsunade also pulled out a pair of goggles, keeping a spare pair on hand for when she found Jiraiya.

A plume of fire lit up the sky, and Tsunade glanced upwards. Through the smoke she could see the fireball, bright like the sun on a cloudy day, and the shadows of two figures flying in separate directions. She crouched, and sprang after the nearest one. If it was Jiraiya, then she could meet up with him, make a plan of attack. If not...

Well, she always was the better of her team in taijutsu. She could hold Hanzo off long enough for Jiraiya to enter the fray.

She jumped up, through the smog, at the nearing figure, and found Hanzo. The man looked older than she remembered, almost of an age with her. His skin cracked and flaked, and in one hand was a Kusari-Gama. The other hand held the weighted end of the chain.

Blackened eyes narrowed, and the weighted chain went flying after Tsunade with a flick of the wrist. The metal weight wobbled in the air as it passed Tsunade by, and she took hold of the chain, smirking. A twirl of the hand had the chain wrapped around her wrist, and she yanked. Almost too late she realized that Hanzo _wanted_ that to happen, wanted her to take hold of the chain, pull him closer. She snapped out a kick, the heel of her sandal meeting Hanzo's swing of the Kusari-Gama where the blade met the handle, just above where Hanzo had a tight grip on the weapon. The dead man's eyes glittered with amusement, and Tsunade planted her other foot down on Hanzo's knee, stopping his kick. One hand occupied, and both legs focused on stopping Hanzo's attacks, Tsunade's free hand lit up with chakra. At such close range, it didn't matter where she hit; the chakra scalpel would slice right through him.

Hanzo's free hand lashed out, a open palm strike that would have cracked her sternum.

Tsunade adjusted, the chakra scalpel cutting his arm off as she pulled away. She let the chain go loose from her hand and kicked off of his weapon. Tsunade used the distance to kick Hanzo's lost arm back at the man, letting the man get a taste of the active explosive tag he'd tried to stick to her. Tsunade landed, keeping her eyes on Hanzo, only to see both him and the explosive tag get coated in oil.

“Well, well,” Jiraiya laughed as he landed beside her. “Looks like the Princess isn't as rusty as she thought.”

“Shut up,” she chided, not taking her eyes off of Hanzo even as she took off the goggles. The undead man hit the ground in a plume of ashen smoke, his arm landing some distance away. Already she could see the severed arm breaking apart, the ash mixing with the oil to make a murky sludge. If they were lucky, the same thing was slowing Hanzo's arm from growing back. “He's sloppy. I never would have landed a hit before.”

“Maybe it means you're just that good.” Jiraiya smirked, and the two toads on his shoulders smacked him.

“Shaddup!” Pa admonished.

“Lady Hokage's right, y'know,” Ma added with a knowing nod. “Them Edo Tensei ain't nothing but shadows of the people they once was.”

“I've noticed.” Jiraiya's jovial smile faded away into a thoughtful frown. “We got in a few hits that shouldn't have. Hit, I mean. You think he's baiting a close-range attack?”

“I think he's got something up his sleeve,” Tsunade answered. “Something nobody's seen before. I think we should go with formation K.”

“K? K...” Jiraiya mulled it over, then gasped. “You mean from the time with that Kiri-nin with the–”

“Yes.” Tsunade nodded, cracking her knuckles. Beside her, Jiraiya chuckled.

“You...” He shook his head. “That's gonna need some working, since we don't have–”

“Work around it,” Tsunade said. “We're better than we were back then.”

“If you say so,” Jiraiya hedged. He made the rat seal, his hair becoming spikier, sharper. “Then lets go.”

Tsunade leaped back, toward the edge of the pit, while Jiraiya leaped forward. She reached the edge of the pit, and pulled back a fist. Her punch cracked the cliff wall, a crater forming from the impact. She punched again, deepening the crater and weakening the cliff face further.

Jiraiya approached the healed Hanzo, who was picking up the fallen Kusari-Gama, and rushed at the incoming sage. Jiraiya flipped through hand seals, his hair growing longer and longer. The end twisted and curled, turning into the shape of a lion as he spun. The lion bit into Hanzo, tearing away his cloak, while the force of Jiraiya's spin pulled the Salamander along for the ride. Jiraiya almost considered stabbing the Edo Tensei with his hair, immobilizing Hanzo long enough for him to Seal the man away, but decided against it. Formation K was more than enough, especially when Hanzo seemed to be baiting them into close combat.

Tsunade leaped away from the rumbling, cracking cliff face. “Now!”

Jiraiya flung Hanzo into the crater, the impact causing the entire cliff side to collapse, tons of rock and topsoil falling down on the undead. Tsunade landed beside Jiraiya, who watched the crumbling cliff with amusement. “Damn,” he chuckled. “Would you look at that.”

“Now all that's left is to wait for the cliff to stop enough to Seal hi–” Tsunade was cut off when the weighted end of the Kusari-Gama wrapped her midsection, the chain yanking taut and pulling her toward the rubble.

“Tsunade!” Jiraiya cried, leaping after her. Tsunade dug her heels in, Both hands on the chain and pulling back. Jiraiya took hold of the chain as well, using every bit of strength Nature Energy afforded him to resist the motion. Tsunade stopped, but only barely. “Pa!”

“Got 'em!” Pa croaked, clapping his hands together. A torrent of water burst out of his mouth, before he closed his lips around it, creating a thin jet of cutting water. Pa turned his head, the water digging into the cliff side as it closed down on where the chain was, where Hanzo was. The chain yanked again, before going loose.

Jiraiya felt Hanzo, could feel the sickly red of the Salamander's chakra above, and looked up. Hanzo was in the air, cape gone, breathing apparatus gone. His long hair flung loose in the wind, the Kusari-Gama glinting silver. Both his hands were clasped together in the Tiger Seal. Tsunade's grip on the chain tightened, the metal creaking as the individual links warped. For the briefest moment she considered breaking it, just snapping the chain, before deciding against it. It would take too long, and it was easier, far easier, to unwrap it. The weighted chain was wrapped around itself twice, so she flicked her wrist, sending the weight spinning once, twice, away and off of itself and her. Both she and Jiraiya kicked off, moving to the side as Hanzo spat a tornado of fire. Ash clouds trailed behind them as they moved, and Tsunade realized how dangerous a position they were in.

The ash was still heated, still gave off embers, and could still explode into flame. They were surrounded by it, standing it in, seeing it dance in the air around them. It was nothing short of a miracle that the ash hadn't caught fire again, and now it would be their death. They couldn't move out of the pit faster than the fire would spread. They needed more to defeat Hanzo, they needed–

A gust of wind blew across the pit, cutting through the tornado of flame, twisting and warping it in on itself. The jutsu imploded back on Hanzo, the fire mercifully avoiding the ashen ground as it consumed itself. Tsunade wrenched off the breathing mask, gasping and gaping as a figure landed before the duo.

Orochimaru turned to look back at his teammates, black-lined eyes glimmering in fond amusement. “I suggest you hold your thanks, otherwise we'd all be letting out hot air.”

“Orochimaru,” Jiraiya growled, about to rush his old teammate, before Tsunade held out an arm.

“There's no point,” she said, eyes trained on the snake Sannin. “He's an Edo Tensei.”

“You always were observant,” Orochimaru commented with a small grin. “Tobi killed me some time ago. Given the weather, I would estimate it's been several weeks since he killed me.” He sighed. “A pity. Itachi's eyes are lost to me, as is young Sasuke's body.” Orochimaru chuckled. “So tell me of Tobi's machinations. A Joint Alliance between the hidden villages cannot be all he has accomplished, nor can the Edo Tensei be all he has stolen from me.”

“Why should we tell you anything?” Jiraiya growled, and on each shoulder, Pa and Ma expressed agreement. “You've allied yourself with the _enemy_ , you–”

“Jiraiya!” Tsunade snapped. “Orochimaru is as much a pawn in this as anyone. He is Edo Tensei now, which means Madara betrayed and killed him.”

“I have no interest in this war,” Orochimaru supplied, raising his katana – _not_ Kusanagi, Tsunade noticed – as the flames settled down. “Moreover, I will trade what I know of Tobi's plans, if only you tell me which of my experiments he has butchered for his own use.”

“We know about the Infinite Tsukiyomi.” Tsunade countered. “And we know about the Juubi.”

“Is that what he told you?” Orochimaru chuckled. “My, you really know nothing. Very well, I will share with you the truth, if you indulge me.”

“How can we trust you won't betray us?” Tsunade asked. “You _are_ Edo Tensei.”

“I am no longer under Tobi's control,” Orochimaru said. “You have Danzo to thank for that. That Sharingan eye of his is – or rather, _was_ very powerful. It was originally Shisui's eye, I believe. In any event, I would not be averse to one final battle.”

Tsunade considered Orochimaru's offer. His aid in defeating Hanzo, alongside crucial information about Akatsuki's plans... it was enticing. And all he wanted in return... “You want intel on what we've faced so far?”

“Indeed.” Orochimaru glanced at the ashen pit. “This landscape does not offer a plethora of evidence of which experiments were set loose.”

Tsunade nodded, almost jerking Jiraiya as she moved to stand between her old teammates. “You have a deal. Everything you know about Madara, and your help in Sealing away Hanzo, for intel on the creatures Madara has put on the front lines.”

Jiraiya shook his head, chuckling. “Who woulda thought, the Sannin together again. And against the man who named us.”

“The sentimentality is touching,” Orochimaru said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Tsunade guessed that only half of it was actual sarcasm.

Tsunade nodded, feeling the nostalgia of their old team, facing off against the Salamander twenty years before. "Let's go."

* * *

Onoki wheezed, feeling every day of his eighty-four years. He floated above the forest, in a circle with four earth clones. He glanced from side to side, aware of how his mentor worked.

Mu had become the Nidaime Tsuchikage in the early days of the First War. Back then the Shodai Tsuchikage's death was attributed to an assassination by Uchiha Madara, thought to be the work of the Shodai Hokage, Hashirama. Mu was known for as the Nothing Man, able to refine the chameleon jutsu to such an extent even the best sensors could not locate him. Mu's legacy was the Kekkei Tota, the ability to combine three elements and creating a new style. Mu kept the secret to himself, teaching only one other how he managed it. Alongside the secret of Kekkei Tota, Mu also informed Onoki of the only way to counteract the Jinton, the Dust Release: itself.

Movement to the left. Two Onokis held their hands at the ready. It would take less than a second to have a block created, less than ten seconds to counteract Mu's own Jinton and set a counter at where he would be. Longer than ten seconds, and he would miss.

A glint of light, and Onoki struck. One remained in place, its own Jinton countering Mu's. An implosion of yellow light, condensed and contained into a sphere, formed out of the opposing jutsu. While the Jinton collided, the four Onoki circled the place Mu's Jinton was coming from. Onoki was certain that his mentor would be there, as Jinton needed the user to continually supply the chakra powering it. Mu could not move when he was invoking Kekkei Tota, and neither could Onoki. This was when they were at their most vulnerable. Mu combated it with his fission jutsu, while Onoki had his earth clones. In this manner, Onoki had the advantage.

Two Onoki moved closer, while the other two backed away. One aimed high, the other low, as a small cube materialized between their respective hands. They pushed out, the cubes growing larger, covering the space Mu was, or should have been. A flash of light, and the cubes dissipated with a whoosh of displaced air, everything within rent to dust. Both clones glanced at the space between their jutsu, for any sign of what little of Mu wasn't dust.

A cube, considerably larger than theirs, encased the two clones. In a flash of light, they were both dust. The air warped, Mu revealing himself as the cube dissipated. “You are smart, Onoki, but your age betrays you. Only four clones?”

Mu's lower half became encased in a cylinder, vanishing into dust. His torso began to fall, ash trailing after it, attempting to reform Mu's legs. A cone formed between Mu's hands, before expanding and shooting outward, a beam that obliterated everything in it's path. The remaining four Onoki scattered, daring out of the way of the attack. One clone, the one that had engaged Mu before, was caught up in the attack, all of him reduced to dust. Mu spun, balance lost from the loss of his legs, his Jinton cutting deep crevasses in the forest below.

Two Onoki remained: the original and his last earth clone. The real Onoki hung back, creating some distance while the clone surged forward. Mu's Jinton faded, the jutsu ended, and the clone reached behind him. The clone hooked its arms around Mu's from underneath, earthen fingers interlocking behind the Edo Tensei's head as it locked Mu's arms outward, keeping his hands from coming close enough together to form jutsu. Mu's fall slowed, then stopped, and he glanced at the stumps of his legs as they began to reform. “This will not be enough to defeat me, Onoki.”

“It is not meant to defeat you,” the clone said. “It is meant to stop you.”

“To stop me is to defeat me,” Mu replied, one hand forming a seal while the other reached back, bending at the elbow to touch the clone on the shoulder. “Doton. Weighted Boulder Jutsu.”

The clone shuddered, trying to resist as its weight was returned to it and then some. Mu took the chance to crack through the clone's arms, breaking it apart and letting the weighted clone fall to the earth. Mu's legs finished regenerating, and Onoki watched it all happen with a grim eye. His hands were pressed together, forming more chakra, and he pulled them apart. Between his palms a cube formed.

“Grandpa!” Kurotsuchi cried, and Onoki took his eyes off his mentor to see his son and granddaughter standing at the edge of the crevasse Mu had created. He opened his mouth, beginning to shout a warning, when his vision turned yellow. A massive cube surrounded him, and for a brief moment Onoki felt horror at his foolishness.

A flash of light, and then he felt no more.

* * *

 

Tsunade first encountered Hanzo the Salamander when she was twenty-nine. She and her team had been part of a forward battalion eighty strong, intent on taking Amegakure as a forward operating base, somewhere for Konoha to gain a foothold and stronghold in the area. The battalion was in the fields East of Ame when Hanzo struck. The entire battle lasted barely ten minutes, and by the end of it Tsunade and her team had gained notoriety. Hanzo had dubbed them the Sannin, and in the wake of surviving Hanzo, for the rest of the Second War, that name stuck.

It had been over twenty years since then, and many things had changed. Tsunade was Hokage now, Jiraiya was a sage, and Orochimaru...

She glanced at the Edo Tensei, noticed how languid he seemed, how relaxed. Death seemed to have calmed him. She couldn't tell his health anymore, as his skin cracked and peeled in ways that shrieked death and decay to her instincts, the stillness of his skin from the lack of need to breathe, the lack of heartbeat. He looked like death.

“Hanzo is goading close combat,” Orochimaru noted. “Given his proclivity to poisons, I would suggest that I be the one to indulge him.”

“With that thing?” Jiraiya snorted at the katana in Orochimaru's grip. “Don't you have that Kusanagi you loved so much with you?”

“Sadly, I lost it in a prior engagement,” Orochimaru loftily replied. “But it is the wielder that makes a weapon dangerous, not the weapon itself.”

“It's all in how you use it, huh?” Jiraiya leered, and Tsunade would have shoved him out of the pit had her teammate not been needed for the coming battle.

“That's it, I'm taking on Hanzo while you two boys compare sizes.” Tsunade stepped forward, pulling out the breathing mask and raising it to her face. Orochimaru stopped her with a single pale hand.

“I wouldn't dream of wasting such beauty on the likes of him. Please, allow me,” he said with a slick smile, and Jiraiya stepped to Tsunade's other side, nodding.

“What he said. Pa! Ma! Get ready for some stir-fry. Tonight's meal is roasted newt.” Jiraiya smirked, his mouth full of sharply pointed teeth.

“It's a salamander, you fool.” Orochimaru swung his sword, sending a crescent of wind after Hanzo. Hanzo jumped above the attack, spinning the blade of his Kusari-Gama high in the air, the air wavering from the heat. The chain flung outwards, after Orochimaru, and he let it wrap around his blade. The blade swung down, cutting deep into Orochimaru, slicing him in half from shoulder to waist. “Ow.”

Tsunade rushed, ignoring the desire to heal Orochimaru – he was dead, he would heal – and took hold of the chain at both ends. In one hand she had the side leading to the weighted end, while the other hand kept Hanzo from recalling his blade. From above, Jiraiya and the two toad elders spat their jutsu. Oil met flame met wind, and Hanzo was bathed in a vat of searing heat.

Tsunade felt the chain begin to heat up, saw the links start to glow and warp, and she yanked. The molten metal fell apart, the heated links snapped, and she dropped the two chains. Hanzo was now without his main weapon. Behind her, Orochimaru's two halves had regenerated back together, and he moved to stand beside Tsunade. “That was very cutting, don't you think?”

“No two ways about it,” Tsunade agreed. “Hanzo will be seeking retribution for his lost weapon.”

“But not the stir fry?” Orochimaru asked, watching as the Salamander spat out a gout of flame after Jiraiya. “Never mind.”

“Were you always this morbid, or did dying have more of an impact on you than you thought?” Tsunade asked, not taking her eyes off of Hanzo's burning form.

“I am as I always was,” Orochimaru replied. “And you? You're certainly more blasé about Jiraiya than I remember you being. Has he finally worn you down after all these years?”

Tsunade shook her head. “Jiraiya's actually mellowed out. And all it took was me nearly killing him.”

“That was a good day.” Orochimaru watched as Jiraiya landed several feet away. Jiraiya's hands were clasped in a hand seal for Doton, and he hummed. “It seems the ground is about to get rather swampy. We'd best move.”

Tsunade leaped back, while Orochimaru flickered several meters back. The flaming earth became subsumed as it turned into the Underworld Swamp, and Hanzo's burned figure vanished beneath it. Jiraiya straightened up, chuckling. “That should slow him down.” The earth exploded, the mud putting out the flames as they splattered everywhere. Jiraiya frowned. “Or just, y'know, make him angry.”

He dodged another gout of flame, and moved to distance himself from where Hanzo was approaching. Orochimaru rushed forward, and he swung the sword in a one-handed slash to the side, only for Hanzo to dodge it, crouching down to slam both hands on the ground. Earthen spikes shot up, aiming to skewer Orochimaru, only for him to charge the katana with chakra and cleave the attack to pieces. The sword chipped, and Orochimaru frowned.

Several dozen yards away, Tsunade frowned as well. “He's not doing so well.”

“He's not supposed to,” Jiraiya commented, crouching behind her. The marks from Natural Energy faded, his toad features shrinking away as he returned to normal. Pa and Ma poofed back to the Summon realm, and Jiraiya slumped down. “Looks like I've reached my limit as a sage.”

“You've still got me,” Tsunade said. “But you can Seal things up just fine, right?”

“If Orochimaru can immobilize him, then yeah.” Jiraiya nodded. “I can Seal the both of them right up.”

“We Seal him up after we Seal Hanzo,” Tsunade declared. “He has information on the enemy, and reneging on a deal with him never ends well.”

“It got us you.”

Tsunade's frown tightened, shoulders stiffening. “Shut up and watch for the signal.”

Orochimaru lifted the katana, studying the cracks in the blade. “So non-conductive metals become brittle when infused with chakra? I'll have to keep this short, then.” He sighed. “And this was such fun, too.”

Leaping forward, Orochimaru put the sword into both hands. Hanzo jumped up, left foot landing on the flat of the blade, the other kicking at Orochimaru's head. He tilted his head, dodging it, and Hanzo bent his right leg, catching his opponent from behind. Orochimaru surged forward, off-balance, as Hanzo leaped off of the cracked sword. Metal shattered, and the katana was reduced to a broken blade with a hilt. Hanzo's hands flitted through hand seals, spitting out a fireball that aimed to consume Orochimaru.

Orochimaru inhaled, as a splash of oil hit the fireball, catching the flames. He exhaled, the ball of wind sending the fireball back at its caster. Hanzo switched jutsu, spitting out a mud wall that hung in the air as it was hit by the fireball. Orochimaru moved to the side, away from the area as the flaming mud wall collapsed onto the ashen ground. Hanzo used the falling mud wall as a jumping-off point, leaping to the charred remnants of a tree. Orochimaru leaped from behind, thrusting the broken blade deep into the lumbar of Hanzo's spine, jerking the weapon to the left. It tore through Hanzo, and from his wound a sickly pale yellow gas emerged. Hanzo's movements dulled, frozen by the unexpected attack, and Orochimaru briefly felt a sense of numbness when he came into contact with the poison cloud. His own movements were slowed, but he still could move more than Hanzo.

Thrusting a hand in the air, Orochimaru grinned as Jiraiya and Tsunade approached, both wearing breathing masks. The skin of his face cracked and peeled. “That was an excellent battle. We really should do it again sometime. It was indeed... nostalgic.”

Jiraiya ignored him, pulling out a black scroll and scribbling ink all over it. Tsunade approached Orochimaru. “I'd thank you for your services, but that would be a disservice to everyone.”

“What? No healing for me?” His body started to glow, and his grin widened. “Very well. It seems my time here is coming to an end. Who would have thought I would be the first to die?”

Tsunade cursed, sparing a glance at where Hanzo was being Sealed within the black scroll. “The Edo Tensei hasn't been ended! Why–”

“Spirits set at rest tend to release themselves from the contract. They move on, so to speak.” Orochimaru glanced at where his hands started to flake, ash falling away from him. “Mountains' Graveyard, in the Land of Demons. _That_ is where you will find the answer. Now tell me, what experiments of mine has Tobi corrupted into this war?”

“There's beasts, normal people we think, with purple skin and animal characteristics.” Tsunade replied. “What answer?”

“The cursed mark subjects from the north?” Orochimaru tutted. “That can't be everything he took from me.”

“Orochimaru!” Tsunade snarled. “Answer me! What answer?”

“Why Tobi did all of this, of course.” Orochimaru smiled, his spirit raising above the artificial body. “Answer my question please. We don't have much time.”

Tsunade growled, angry at her old teammate's blithe attitude. “People at the coast! They can turn their bodies into water. Now tell me, who is the man behind the mask?”

“The Hozuki I engineered?” Orochimaru hummed, his spirit floating ever higher. Below him, the artificial body broke apart, leaving a dead person behind amidst a pile of ashes. “That can't be all... oh well. As for who he is... I haven't the faintest idea.”

His spirit faded, leaving Tsunade alone with Jiraiya. She snarled, fists clenched, before turning to walk away. “Hanzo is Sealed?”

Jiraiya waved the black scroll, tied shut. “As Sealed away as can be.”

“Then let's reconnect with the Tsuchikage. HQ needs to know about this.”

“And Mountains' Graveyard?”

"That is for Shikaku to decide," Tsunade said. "Orochimaru had no need to lie to us, but we can't ignore intel from him. Not like this. Let's go!"

* * *

Kurotsuchi watched in horror as her grandfather vanished, watched as the Nidaime killed him. She knew grandfather's mentor had been strong, had been terrifying in his day, but to see it...

She glanced at Pa, who kept his eyes on the Nidaime. Turning her attention back to the opponent, she saw that he was staring their way. Her gaze hardened. Now was not the time for emotions, for grieving. “What's our plan of attack, Yondaime Tsuchikage?”

Pa stiffened, before nodding sharply. He made a hand seal, reaching out and touching her on the shoulder. Kurotsuchi felt herself become lighter, and realized that he intended the two of them to battle together. She floated up until her feet were level with his head, and glanced down to see that he was flipping through hand seals. He gave her a once-over, before crouching. “You're going to do air combat while I prepare to crush him from both sides. Keep moving, make yourself a hard target to pin down.”

Kurotsuchi nodded. She was the distraction. Nothing else mattered but the defeat of their opponent. She turned toward her opponent, flying up to meet him.

For all the tales she'd heard of the Nidaime, he was smaller than expected. A part of her wondered if that was because it had been Grandfather who had told the stories. Another part wondered if his grandeur was all in spite of his normal size, normal look. She suspected that, underneath all those wrappings, he looked entirely unremarkable, the kind of person that could never be picked out of a crowd.

But underneath it all was a shrewd mind, something dangerous that had managed to do something that had been impossible: merge three natures into something new. The Jinton, she knew, was the expansion of the Yoton she possessed. Fire and earth, two elements she already had mastery of, mixed with air, and she had no clue how he did it. And somehow, he had taught this secret to grandfather, who had not passed it on. Perhaps, if he'd lived, it would have passed on to another. Kurotsuchi thought of her younger brother, of his genius mastery of Bakuton at such a young age. Shirotsuchi would have been taught it, not her. Kunoichi were never allowed to be too strong, or in the front lines. She hated it, hated that tradition dictated that she and every other Kunoichi eventually settle down and rear children. She loved children, and had no issue if any Kunoichi desired to one day retire from the forces and become a housewife. Kurotsuchi took issue with the idea that _every_ Kunoichi wanted to become housewives and mothers, was _supposed_ to become housewives and mothers both.

Kurotsuchi felt rage build up inside her, and channeled it into her chakra. The anger burned white-hot, setting her chakra on fire and making the Yoton she was forming even more dangerous. Out here, the only ones she could care to avoid friendly fire from was herself and Pa. She spat out the lava balls, keeping on the move so the Nidaime wouldn't feel compelled to defend by simply using Jinton to eradicate both Kurotsuchi and her attack.

She flew above, forming another attack, a widespread blanket of lava that cast a shadow over the forest as it descended. Keep moving, she told herself. Do not be an easy target.

The lava balls collided with the blanket of lava, and Kurotsuchi saw a yellow beam cut a hole through her second attack. She flipped through hand seals, preparing the quicklime jutsu. So long as that attack was in effect, she had a good idea of where the Nidaime was, and with that hole he was making, a better idea of how he intended to dodge. The yellow light began to fade, and she sent a blanket of quicklime covering the hole. The quicklime exploded when it hit the lava, and the forest below was scattered into flames. Kurotsuchi grinned when she saw that the quicklime had gotten the Nidaime, a coating over his shoulders and back betraying the Nothing Man's invisible form.

He faded back into visibility, eyeing the attack when it seemingly did nothing to him. “You are an excellent strategist, for a Kunoichi.”

Below, the lava attack hit the forest, and the trees caught fire and the lava seeped into the crevasse, pulled there by the parts of it that had fallen that way. Kurotsuchi took the compliment in spite of the insult. “I was taught by the best.”

“Indeed.” The Nidaime canted his head, eyes tracking where she was circling him as fast as she could. A moving target, she told herself. Much hard to hit than one that held still.

And the Nidaime was very much holding still.

She finished the hand seals for a Suiton jutsu, and sent water cascading after the Nidaime. The quicklime would harden upon contact, and his movement would be limited. Perhaps even enough for the Jinton to have been stopped. It was a slim chance, but until it happened, Kurotsuchi would not stop moving.

The Nidaime dodged, flying away from the water before it could hit him. On instinct, she gathered, since the invention of the quicklime jutsu was long after his death. He couldn't know what she was doing, that she was intending on soaking him, immobilizing him. Or perhaps he _did_ know – stopping the movements of an Edo Tensei was common knowledge, even during his time. Perhaps he suspected the purpose of the quicklime jutsu, even induced the nature of it when she switched gears and sent a Suiton jutsu as an attack.

A flash of yellow came from the Nidaime, and Kurotsuchi swore and dived, sweeping down and curving to the side, then down and back. Below, the water hit the lava and hissed up steam, while the rest of it hit the quicklime that hadn't exploded and hardened it stiff. She dodged the Jinton, watching as it faded, and kept an eye on the Nidaime. He had both hands in the rat seal, and the quicklime was crumbling off of him, hardened to stone.

She cursed him, and cursed the Jinton. How was it even possible to create wind chakra on top of earth and fire? She had once looked into the process, and had no clue how it could even be. How did one split their chakra and grind it finely and sharply against itself, even while forming fire and earth cha–

Kurotsuchi gasped, dodging another blast of Jinton. Could... could that be the secret? The way to Jinton?

“Pa!” She cried, letting off another Suiton jutsu at the lava below. She needed more steam. The Nidaime might have been a sensor, but even sensors couldn't perform their duties while in the midst of battle. The steam clung to her skin, made her feel hot and sticky, but she persisted. Sending another volley of lava balls at the Nidaime, she dived into the steam, sweeping away from where the Nidaime would be defending and counterattacking, to meet with Pa. “Do it!”

Through the steam she could see the yellow light of Jinton, and watched it fade. Kurotsuchi smirked.

The forest shuddered, rising up and collapsing in on itself, Two halves of a circle that crashed together, crushing the trees within – and the Nidaime as well. If he was like grandfather, then he couldn't reform the Jinton immediately after use. This would hold him, until she could confirm her suspicion.

“Pa!” She landed where he was, and let out a breath when she saw him straining to keep the jutsu up. “I have an idea. It might not work, but if it does...”

“Will it stop him?” Pa asked, keeping his attention on the mountain he'd created to hold the Nidaime.

“If I'm right, it will.” Kurotsuchi nodded. “Just keep him there while I get into position. Hold him as long as you can.”

Pa grunted, and Kurotsuchi flew up, level with the mountain he'd raised. She held both hands up, palms inches apart. Earth chakra flowed in her right hand, strong and hard. Fire chakra flowed in her left hand, fluid and scorching. She breathed out, grinding the two natures against each other. An image popped into her head, the cube she'd seen her grandfather make dozens of times, and focused on that. The chakra ground against itself, finely and sharply.

 _Just like honing a Kunai_ , she thought.

Yellow light sparked in the space between her hands. She smiled, thrilled that her theory was right. There was no wind chakra involved – it was merely molding the fire and earth chakra together like one would to create wind chakra.

The jutsu fizzled out, and Kurotsuchi's grin tightened. She tried again, grinding the chakra together, and the beginnings of a cube formed. It was slow, and took all her concentration to keep up. She wouldn't be able to move while using Jinton, that was for certain – it took far too much concentration to maintain the jutsu. But if _she_ couldn't move, then... could the same be said of the Nidaime?

Kurotsuchi recalled seeing the Nidaime's use of Jinton, and realized that was the case. Not once had he moved while using Jinton. Before, yes, as well as after, but not at all while the jutsu was active. This, she thought, was the key part of defeating the Nidaime and Sealing him.

The side of Pa's mountain exploded, and Kurotsuchi went on instinct, flipping through the hand seals needed to batter the opening with lava balls. She had to box him in, lead the Nidaime into the right area. Negate the Jinton, then immobilize him with quicklime. By keeping him in the area of Pa's mountain jutsu, it kept the Nidaime from hanging in the air. The Sealing Corps could then Seal him away.

She watched as a cube appeared, reducing the attack to dust. She held her hands together, keeping level with the break, and created a cylinder in her hands. From within the crater, she saw the Nidaime pull himself out of the remains of the forest. The cylinder between her hands fizzled out, and Kurotsuchi cursed. She tried again, recreating the cylinder. Wind chakra change in nature was difficult to maintain, and she supposed it was only her natural skill at creating Yoton that gave her the ability to produce Jinton so quickly.

A flash of yellow, and Kurotsuchi pushed her own Jinton out, feeding more chakra into it. It expanded, and the two Jinton collided, imploding into a sphere of destructive force. The trees below were reduced to dust, along with parts of the mountain jutsu. The sphere faded, and Kurotsuchi saw the Nidaime floating across from her.

“Onoki passed the secret along?” the Nidaime said, surprised. “That was prudent of him. Although you wield it like Onoki did, back when he first learned. How recently did he teach you?”

“He didn't.” She spat out more quicklime at the Nidaime, who flew upwards to dodge it. Kurotsuchi put her hands together, this time creating a conical shape. The Jinton formed much faster, and she launched it. The Jinton cut through the air, chasing after the Nidaime. She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of going into hiding, not at this point.

The Nidaime countered with his own Jinton, a rectangle that collided with her cone and became another sphere of destructive power. The remaining steam from the lava had dissipated, leaving the air saturated with wetness. The vacuums created by the Jinton created cloudbursts, pulling the water out of the air and into patches of fog that clung in the air before falling to the ground. That was good, Kurotsuchi thought. Without the water in the air, the quicklime would hold long enough for her to activate it when it was time.

There was movement out of the corner of her eye, and she spotted Pa running up the mountain, behind the Nidaime. She smirked.

Kurotsuchi sent another wave of lava after the Nidaime, keeping him occupied long enough for her to act. She laid out another quicklime attack, coating the now-clear forest floor in it, and flew high. She huffed as soon as she was above the Nidaime, and prepared another attack. Kurotsuchi had enough chakra left in her for two more attacks, and she had to make them count.

Preparing another cone, she fired down at the Nidaime. Below, the Nidaime countered with a cylinder, and the two jutsu collided in the air, imploding in another sphere. Kurotsuchi saw Pa jump, one hand in the rat seal, and grinned. Victory was theirs.

The Nidaime's jutsu cut off, and she got to watch as Pa landed a hand on him. He cried out, “Doton: Weighted Boulder Jutsu!”

Kurotsuchi went through the seals, preparing a shower of water to join the Nidaime as he fell like a brick down into the pool of quicklime. The Nidaime couldn't move as the water came down, locking him into place as the quicklime was activated. Kurotsuchi flew down to catch Pa, who nodded his thanks.

Both father and daughter went down to see the Nidaime was trapped, unable to move. Two members of the Sealing Corps raced to their location, a roll of cloth ready to seal away the Nidaime. Pa reached down, grabbing at the Nidaime's uncovered chest, and undid the jutsu. He yanked, pulling the Nidaime free from the trappings of the jutsu – and tearing off his limbs in the process.

Already the arms and legs were reforming, and the Nidaime chuckled as the cloth started to wrap around him, Sealing him away. “You figured out the secret to Jinton on your own?”

Kurotsuchi nodded. “It's all in the chakra, isn't it.”

“Clever girl.” The Nidaime's eyes vanished in the whirlwind of cloth binding, and soon he was Sealed away.

“So. Mind sharing that secret with your Pa?” Pa chuckled, but Kurotsuchi shook her head.

“No. I think I'll keep it to myself for a little while. You know how it is.” She smiled, then put a finger to her lips. “Although... I suppose this makes me a shoo-in for _Godaime_ Tsuchikage?”

“It gives you a leg up over the competition,” Pa said with a nod. The both of them turned to see Jiraiya and the Hokage heading their way.

“Kitsuchi!” The Hokage nodded at Pa. “Where is old Onoki? We have intel we need to share with him on the way to HQ.”

“You'll have to tell me, then,” Pa said. “The Sandaime fell in battle. I am the Tsuchikage now.”

The Hokage glanced at the Sealed form of the Nidaime. “My condolences. How did you defeat him, then? I thought the old– Onoki was the only one who could combat him?”

“I figured out the secret to Kekkei Tota,” Kurotsuchi said, saluting the Hokage. “I am now the sole possessor of Jinton.”

“The Nidaime's defeat was a joint effort between me and my daughter,” Pa said. “Now, the intel you had – you and I can review it _after_ we defeat the Nidaime Mizukage.”

“The other Kage will need to be informed of this,” the Hokage acknowledged. “We Seal the last of the Edo Tensei in the area and then you and me fall back to HQ. The war has changed – it isn't what we thought it was.”

Pa nodded, his face grim. “Then let's go.”

Kurotsuchi followed the two Kage, trailing behind despite the weight-altering jutsu still being in effect for her. Whatever that intel was, it couldn't possibly change the war front at this point. The Joint Alliance held the upper hand, now that the Edo Tensei were getting Sealed away. They were winning the war. The Akatsuki couldn't have anything else up their sleeve to change the fact that it was losing.

She spared a glance back at the Sealed form of the Nidaime being carried off to behind front lines. The Joint Alliance _was_ winning, right?

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So with this, the final stretch to the end begins. With luck, the next chapter will be coming out around October ninth. 
> 
> So the theory behind Kekkei Tota presented here is one I've been agonizing over for the last three years and only made headway in the last two weeks. All this for one single chapter. 
> 
> There's also the reveal of Izuna and Madara's ocular powers. I didn't enjoy the idea presented in canon that all mangekyo can produce the same jutsu - jutsu that were first shown being used by itachi (with the only exception being the kamui, which itachi never used). Here, different mangekyo produce entirely different jutsu.


	46. Battle Lines

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Strange figures appear in the fog of night, as the Jinchuuriki approach the HQ of the Joint Alliance.

Cee shivered in the night air, patrolling the borders of the forward line. The ground squished under his feet, still wet from the rain. Fog hung heavy in the air. He clicked the radio. "Sector seventeen. No survivors spotted. No enemies either. Over."

The radio crackled. "Received. Rendezvous with Neji and return to Forward Ops."

Cee sighed, his breath fogging in the chill. That wasn't good. He hadn't seen any flares, or been recalled to heal surviving Shinobi. What he had seen were bodies, dozens upon dozens of bodies. Most he didn't recognize, nameless Shinobi whose tags he'd pulled, and the bodies of the enemy. In death, their animalistic features faded, leaving them looking like normal humans. He wondered if they knew what the war was, who they were fighting, who they were fighting for. Some of the more intact bodies were retrieved and sent back to the medical camp for analysis. The Hokage had spread the word that the purple enemies had something called a cursed mark, and that sending some bodies for analysis would give them an advantage for the second wave.

There was movement to the side. Cee froze, pulling out a signal flare. He hadn't sensed anything– wait. He could sense something. Flickers of chakra, like fireflies. And... something more. Something human.

Slowly, the shape took form, revealing a familiar face.

"Jay? Gods, is that you?" Cee took a half-step toward his friend, baffled. He couldn't sense anything more than the firefly flickers of chakra that seemed to surround him. No, that wasn't right. He could sense something, someone. Two distinct chakras, one of them almost identical to the flickers that permeated the area. "Jay, what's going on?" Jay didn't respond, only ambling closer and closer. Cee lowered a hand to his hip pouch, preparing for attack. Something wasn't right about this. "Jay, answer me! What's going–"

Cee cut off with a gasp as Jay came close enough for him to really see his friend. Blood coated the front of Jay's pants, the trail coming from the gaping hole that used to be Jay's sternum.

All around Cee, the bodies started to move. Cee clicked the radio. "Contact, sector seventeen! Prep for flare signal!"

"Repeat, sector seventeen. Are there survivors?"

Cee pulled out a Kunai. The dead began to rise, broken bodies standing firm. He still couldn't sense any signs of life from them, every body felt like the firefly flickers. He popped the cap to the flare, pointing it to the sky. A spark of chakra, and the flare lit up.

The dead moved. Blood splashed on the loam.

The radio crackled. "Sector seventeen, repeat! Cee! Are there survivors?"

"The dead are rising! Repeat, the dead are rising!" Cee cut down another body, sliced through muscle and sinew and bone. He spotted pale figures in the fog, their wailing echoing through the air. "Set Katon users on the front lines. Burn the dead! Repeat, burn the dead!"

* * *

Shikaku looked over at the deployment maps. Ay and Chiyo sat two ends of the table. Ay tapped a finger on the table impatiently. "I hate this!"

"We are all unhappy with this." Chiyo replied. "To be played like puppets by this man..."

Shikaku sighed, reaching out for the little black idol. "The Ambush Squad is the only one within range. We can send them to scout out Mountains' Graveyard. Our current deployment in the South can move torward it. Darui holds the coast, and with the perimeter secured Kakashi can take the two divisions and push forward. We can give them another three hours of rest before changing deployment."

"See?" Chiyo said. "The Jinchuuriki are less than an hour away from arrival. What does this Orochimaru fellow's death mean for us? One less enemy at our gates."

"Learned when we had enemies _within_ our gates." Ay countered. "I will not be happy until this war is over. We need to hear the accounts from the Jinchuuriki. Hoshigaki Kisame Summoned the masked man, who in turn Summoned Madara. They were the furthest part behind our lines, and the only ones who can explain what happened are few and far between. Orochimaru is no longer in this world. Danzo as well is passed on, taking with him Kisame. That leaves the masked man and the Jinchuuriki. Until they are here with us, and we listen to their accounts, I will not feel as though we are truly winning this war."

"He's right." Shikaku sighed. "The masked man could have taken the Jinchuuriki but did not. I do not enjoy the idea of interrogating the Jinchuuriki, but it must be done. It was a lack of knowledge that created this war, but knowledge brings clarity. Knowledge will end this war."

"Update from the Southern front!" Inoichi called out, and everyone glanced at the barrier. The orb remained quiet, little ripples passing across the calm surface. "The dead are rising! Reports are coming in of fallen Shinobi rising again. Sensors on the front report foreign chakra invading the bodies, with figures in the distance."

"The dead..." Shikaku glanced at the reports. "Edo Tensei?"

"Not Edo Tensei." Inoichi paused. "The Shinobi who fell in the front lines, and even the enemies, they are rising. Wait. New update! There's... the dead seem to be faltering. Sensors are reporting... the figures are tall and thin, deathly pale. They travel in pairs."

Ay stiffened. "The Tensei clan."

Shikaku paused. "What are the Tensei clan?"

"A lost clan, we thought." Ay frowned. "Children of the Nibi, capable of controlling the dead like your puppeteers, Kazekage."

"Like my grandson, you mean," Chiyo said. "We do not puppet the dead."

"Don't you?" Ay wondered.

"Lord Raikage," Shikaku cut in. "If you have information on this enemy–"

"The Tensei were supposed to have all died out in the Third War. Exterminated in the Invasion of Kusagakure." Ay growled, clenching his fists. "Clearly Orochimaru has brought them back from extinction."

"What weaknesses do they have?" Chiyo asked. "Surely a clan once killed can be killed again."

"They work in pairs, one protecting the other. One controls the dead while the other builds up the chakra needed. They switch out in regular intervals. Fifteen minutes to work the jutsu, fifteen minutes to build the chakra up again." Ay glanced at the deployment map. "They are difficult to get to, but easy to stop. The Tensei clan is entirely nocturnal. Their eyes are sensitive to bright light. Blinding Raiton jutsu and genjutsu will disrupt their manipulations of the dead, long enough to kill them. We lost many good Shinobi to learn this. We should not lose nearly so many this time."

Shikaku nodded. "Inoichi! Inform the front lines."

* * *

Neji wondered what else the enemy had in store for them. Already the Joint Alliance had encountered monsters that wouldn't die easily, so naturally the next stage was to have their dead turned into the enemy.

He struck at the bodies of fallen comrades, locking the Keirakukei that had been flooded with the enemy's jutsu. Another body collapsed, and he dodged the attacks of two more bodies, striking them down. He left explosive tags on the bodies and leaped away, out of range as they went off.

Pulling back, he regrouped with Kakashi-taicho, who was dispatching no less than ten bodies. "This is annoying."

"Oh?" Kakashi-taicho's voice was tight, and he glanced at the burning remains, shoulders rigid. "That's not the word I would use. Insulting, maybe. Monstrous. Not annoying."

"They seem to know which of us are Sensors." Neji replied. "If you haven't noticed, they focus on us."

"Maybe they just don't like you?" Kakashi-taicho offered, beheading two undead. Their bodies fell, the strings cut. "Would you look at that. These zombies are more like zombies than the zombies we fought earlier."

"Taicho?" Neji spun on his heel, stopping another three undead. "With all due respect, stop talking."

Kakashi-taicho sulked. Neji hated how the man could do it while decapitating another two undead. "Whatever happened to the little genin that clung to my every word."

"That was never me," Neji replied, driving a heel into the face of an undead. "Or would you prefer I recite one of Gai-Sensei's speeches?"

Kakashi-taicho squinted in suspicion. Neji enjoyed that expression.

"Taicho!" A small, chubby chunin appeared out of the gloom. She dodged the undead with a nervous glance. "Sir, we have news from HQ. The enemy is the Tensei clan. They're nocturnal, and we are advised to use blinding genjutsu and Raiton jutsu."

Kakashi-taicho hummed. "That's easy to do." He pulled out a flash bomb, tossing it high. It exploded, illuminating the area. In the distance, two screams cut through the air. Kakashi-taicho pointed. "Just follow the screams."

Neji blinked away stars, enough to see that Kakashi-taicho had already gone after the two Tensei. He turned to the chunin, who yelped and saluted. Around them, the undead were already falling back to the ground. "Spread the word that flash bombs work just as well as any jutsu. I'll chase after him and pull him out of trouble."

"But–" The chunin tried to protest, but Neji glared her down.

"Kakashi-taicho is a genius. The flash bombs will conserve the chakra of our forces. Don't take his eccentricities personally. You delivered the message, the division leader amended it, and now you spread that amended leader." Neji paused. "You should leave the front lines. We've no idea how long the enemy will be incapacitated."

The chunin nodded. "Yessir!"

She turned, bounding away and toward the field comms. Neji took a moment to note how Kakashi-taicho had found the two enemies – Tensei, as they were called. Ghoulish creatures they were, exceptionally tall, thin, and skin so pale it was almost translucent.

He ran to Kakashi-taicho's aid, as the man was only in battle with one of the two. The one he came into contact with was swiping at him with nails like claws. Neji batting the attacking one to the side, sending several precision strikes to close off chakra points all along their arms. The Tensei seemed unhindered by the attack, and screamed at Neji with a mouth devoid of teeth. It lunged, swinging the limp arms like they were clubs, and he jumped, avoiding both. All around them, the dead began to rise again.

Neji cursed, sending a deadly palm strike to the Tensei's sternum, pushing enough chakra to rend it's heart to tatters. The Tensei coughed up blood, collapsing backwards as the undead converged on him. The remaining Tensei wailed, pointing an accusing hand at Neji.

Kakashi-taicho burst out of the ground, a Raikiri in hand as he pierced the Tensei's chest. The Tensei went limp around Kakashi-taicho's arm, gums trying to bite at him, before it succumbed to the wound. The undead fell limp again, and Neji stumbled his way out of the pile of bodies. Pulling out a rag, he wiped the Tensei's blood off, while Kakashi-taicho yanked his arm out of the other Tensei's chest. "That was easy."

"Speak for yourself," Neji muttered, while louder he said, "They did not appear proficient in close combat. Certainly that helped."

"Oh, I know it helped," Kakashi-taicho said, pulling out a black scroll. "It just seemed too easy. Like the enemy is trying to delay us, or distract us from something."

Neji tilted his head, sparing a glance at the fallen bodies of the Tensei. They _had_ been rather easy to defeat... "Or maybe the enemy is running out of options? Likely these were intended as the audience of a larger field of bodies. A finishing blow?"

Kakashi-taicho gave Neji a disappointed look. "Sometimes I wonder what Gai even taught you."

"If they were indeed a distraction," Neji began, drawing deep into his patience. "Then what must they be distracting us from?"

* * *

Shikaku breathed out a sigh of relief at hearing of the defeat of the Tensei. Whatever ploy the masked man was playing, he was clearly losing. The Edo Tensei were almost all Sealed, with the exception of the last of those at the coast. The cursed mark victims were all deceased, and the Tensei were following suit. The Hozuki were dried up, and reports had come in of one of them switching sides, aiding in the Sealing of the Seven Swordsmen of Kiri.

"Sir," Mabui, the Raikage's secretary, spoke up from the entrance to the room. "The Jinchuuriki have arrived. Their guard is escorting them up. Sensors at the perimeter have also noted that the Hokage and... and the Tsuchikage are thirty minutes out."

Chiyo laughed. "You see? They are here safe. This masked man is on his last legs. His minions are defeated, and we are closing in on him. He has nothing left in his arsenal. Surely _now_ you feel content that we are winning?"

Ay harrumphed as the door to the room burst open. Bee strode in, the other Jinchuuriki trailing behind at a much more sedate pace. "Bro! Accommodations like no _other_ , welcome to the home of my _brother_!"

Ay's hard gaze softened at the sight of Bee. Shikaku took a step back, keeping out of the way while Bee walked right up to the Raikage and threw an arm over his shoulders. He noticed that Bee still had Samehada on his back. He considered which of the Jinchuuriki would be the best to question, and faced Yagura. "Lord..." He hesitated. "Yagura. What do you remember about Kisame's attack? Do you recall anything about the masked man?"

"Unfortunately," Yagura began. "Hoshigaki Kisame bested all of us. None of us were conscious for Shimura Danzo's arrival, much less anything that followed."

"Not even the Nanabi Jinchuuriki?" Shikaku asked. "Reports came in that she–"

"I do not recall this masked man," Fu interrupted. "The men I have described as seeing are Shimura Danzo and Orochimaru. This Danzo placed me within a genjutsu almost immediately."

Ay shared a glance with Chiyo. "I was unaware Danzo was proficient in genjutsu."

"He shouldn't be," Shikaku approached the table. "Danzo's focus in his career was Sealing, not genjutsu."

"If it matters, the Sharingan he used to place me in the genjutsu was in his right eye, not the ones on his right arm." Fu walked over to where Naruto was fawning over the water globe, listening to Gaara explain how the barrier jutsu worked. Bee pulled off of his brother, following and joining in on the explanation.

Chiyo gave Ay a pointed look, while Ay looked seconds away from punching the table through the window. Shikaku groaned. "Konoha didn't know about Danzo's eye or arm. We would not have sent him to the island if we knew."

"I do not fault you," Ay said, clenching his fist tight. "The Shinobi of Darkness was a man whose secrets had secrets. Although it does cast an unfortunate light on the disposal of the Uchiha within Konoha."

"It doesn't matter now," Chiyo said. "The man is dead. His loss is our gain. Without that Sharingan of his, perhaps we wouldn't know of Orochimaru's death. For certain Danzo's sacrifice was integral in the protection of the Jinchuuriki. Be glad for once. This war is all but won!"

* * *

Izuna spread his hands, the cavern roof warping away, the light of the blood moon casting down upon the Seal. He stood at the center of a massive array, eleven bodies inhabiting nine points. Beside him, Zetsu grew out of the earth. "The Tensei have fallen."

Izuna cursed. "We need more time. The Unsealing needs time to build up. Madara needs time to return."

" **What do you recommend?** " Black Zetsu asked. Izuna took a steadying breath.

"Summon the Jinchuuriki. Spread them across their forward lines. They will buy us the time we need."


	47. Blood Moon Rising

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chaos descends as the war reaches a climax.

The moon hung heavy in the sky, red and vibrant. It shone down on the forest, painting the leaves a dark purple. Beneath the canopy, the Ambush Squad moved in silence. It was a small group, half a dozen Shinobi total, and Kankuro was their leader.

Kiri appeared at his side, hands flying through signs. _New orders from command_.

Kankuro frowned. New orders? Did something change on the front? So far, they hadn't encountered anything, and it set Kankuro on edge.

_What are the orders_ , Kankuro signed back. This far into enemy territory, even a single spoken word meant death. 

_Head East, into the Land of Demons. The Mountains' Graveyard_ , Kiri signed.  _New intel has Akatsuki base located there._

Kankuro's frown sharpened, his lips thinning. This was it. They would strike the blow before the war began.  _Anything else?_

Kiri hesitated, and Kankuro felt it in his bones that this was going to be bad news.  _The war has already begun. Akatsuki uses undead jutsu and beast people, users of nature chakra._ Kiri paused, and Kankuro nodded to continue. Kiri signed,  _the Tensei Clan lives. Orochimaru is undead, not part of war._

Kankuro blinked, processing that last part. Orochimaru... the snake had been a priority target, but if the enemy had somehow slipped past them, then it had to have been his work. Worse still, he was an undead, so someone had to have gone against him, and won. So Orochimaru was out of the war, and apparently had never been a part of it. Only his twisted experiments, and... the Tensei Clan.

He remembered reading about the Second War as a child. The Second War was known as the bloodiest, with the fall of Uzushio, the deaths of several Kage, the massacres of Inuzuri and Kirara village, and the extermination of the Tensei Clan. By the end of the war, the Nibi had been taken into Kumo's custody as part of Kusa's recompense, and much of the Elemental Nations had to locate and secure the Biju for new Jinchuuriki.

Kankuro nodded, waving for the Ambush Squad to change direction. He didn't know what they were about to find at Mountains' Graveyard, but it was sure to change the tide of the war.

* * *

Suigetsu glared at the girl as she gave Shibuki some practice swings. It was clear she knew how to hold a sword, but that didn't mean she knew how to wield Shibuki, much less how to use it.

After Sealing away his brother, Suigetsu stole away Mangetsu's scroll and began to take out all of the seven swordsmen on the coast. It just so happened that this coincided with this Joint Alliance, or whatever they were calling themselves. He was still grinning from the rush of beating the greatest wielders of each of the seven swords, and was ecstatic at having four of the seven in his possession.

Well, okay, he was irritated out of his skin that it wasn't five, because this idiot decided that any weapon dropped in the battlefield was open for anyone to claim as their own. The only consolation he has was that it was by  _his_ hand that all seven of the swordsmen had fallen, and his hand alone. 

The platoon commander – Suigetsu didn't bother to remember his name, but he knew that this guy was the one flinging black lightning at the false Hozuki – approached. “Sorry, but we're going to have to know where you stand now that the main battle is over.”

Suigetsu looked over the ruined coast, at the bodies choking up the water. It was a shame that the false Hozuki hadn't bled, or else Suigetsu would see an ocean stained a darker black in the moonlight. “I told ya, I'm not on Orochimaru's side. Anything else comes out of that water, if it looks like something that I'd cut dead, then I will.”

The commander's eyes hardened. “We're still digging for survivors. I'm sorry, but if I have to take you down, I will. A swordsman's greatest shame is his loss against a fellow swordsman.”

“That's crap,” Suigetsu said, keeping his eyes back on the girl with Shibuki. “The greatest shame a swordsman has is seeing his own blade wielded by an idiot who doesn't know how to even hold it right!”

He yelled that last part at the girl, who flung several Kunai at various parts of his body. Suigetsu blocked all of them, but he had to give her credit for versatility in her weaponry. If she were Kiri-born, he'd gladly proposition her to join his new generation of seven swordsmen. But sadly, she was dressed in Konoha regalia, which meant she couldn't be a part of his swordsmen.

Turning back to the commander, he said, “I just want my swords. And sticking by you will get me close to Chojuro. Besides, this Akatsuki you're up against, that's got my old Sensei, Kisame in it. I'd love to go against him. Those that kill a Hoshigaki wielding one of the seven swords are the legends history remembers.”

“Sorry to say, but Hoshigaki's dead,” the commander said, and Suigetsu paused.

“Huh?”

“I only just got the details, but seems he faked his death against Lord Bee, hiding in that sword of his, and was ultimately killed by a Konoha elder.” The commander didn't shrug, but Suigetsu got the sense that he was doing exactly that. “As for the sword, it took a liking to Lord Bee. He has it.”

“...huh?” A Kumo-Nin... had Samehada? A Konoha elder killed Kisame when he had Samehada in his possession? What level of hell had Suigetsu woken up in? The wheels in his head began to turn, and Suigetsu grinned. “So I just need to kill this Lord Bee, and the Samehada is mine, huh...”

The commander put a hand on the hilt of his sword. “I'd kill you before you even got the chance.”

“You'd try,” Suigetsu replied with a grin, reaching for the scroll. He could use the Kiba–

The ocean exploded, a sound of thunder filling the air.

* * *

 

Kakashi sat on a log, contemplating. If it happened to coincide with him resting up as a medic looked over him, well. Small bonuses, and all that. High above, the moon began to be blotted out in darkness. Kakashi realized that tonight was a special night: there was to be a lunar eclipse. He wondered when the last time one happened, and how rare it was to see a blood moon eclipsed by the shadow of Earth.

“You're thinking too loud.” Kakashi glanced up as Asuma approached. He looked much worse for wear, with one sleeve of his shirt torn away. “Half the battalion can smell the smoke coming outta your head.”

“Not like it isn't without reason,” Kakashi replied, waving the medic off. She bustled away with a dark look, disapproving of his life choices. Or just disapproving of his decision not to get healed. Same difference, really. “The enemy's war plans seem awfully heavy-handed, don't you think?”

“One small terrorist group against the whole Elemental Nations.” Asuma shrugged. “You'd have to go pretty heavy-handed to hold a candle to it.”

“But the opponents we've faced,” Kakashi pointed out. “With the exception of the Edo Tensei, nothing has been more than a single village could handle. If it was all a distraction then it should've changed when Danzo stopped the attack on the Jinchuuriki.”

“Danzo _what_?”

“But that was hours before the Tensei clan was set loose. I mean, it's about midnight, and as much as a reprieve would be great, Akatsuki hasn't proven so quick to honor wartime conduct. It's only a matter of time before the next attack.” Kakashi leaned forward, elbows setting onto his knees. “Still, it doesn't make sense, continuing like that. Madara was reported to have been with the Jinchuuriki, and was spotted fighting with undead Orochimaru. Why give up the Jinchuuriki and chase after Orochimaru like that?”

“Okay wait.” Asuma waved his hands, interrupting Kakashi. “Listen, battalion commander, what the hell are you going on about? Attack on the Jinchuuriki? Undead Orochimaru?”

“Hoshigaki Kisame turned out not to be dead, attacked the Jinchuuriki, then Danzo killed him. Madara appeared, summoned undead Orochimaru, who killed Danzo and fled. Madara went after Orochimaru, the two battled it out, and then broke off. Madara vanished, and Orochimaru appeared at our battlefront to help stop undead Hanzo. Thing is, Madara viewed Orochimaru as a higher priority than the Jinchuuriki, which makes no sense.” Kakashi glanced up at Asuma, who was staring at him, mouth agape.

“Kakashi, what the fuck?” Asuma shook his head. “No, you know what? Forget it. In the past day we've fought monster people, undead people, and literal zombies. Even for Shinobi, this is way into weird territory.” He paused. “...Danzo's really dead?”

Kakashi gave Asuma a look. “Orochimaru killed him. Typically, people die when they're killed.”

Asuma made a face. “Well, yes, but Danzo... I dunno. He just seemed like the kind of person that would outlive us all. Not out of spite but because he's just that stubborn.”

Kakashi shrugged, unable to refute Asuma's point. “He's dead now.”

“Still.” Asuma glanced at a nearby fire, where medics were tending to the injured. “Weird to know that he's dead.”

“Times are changing.” Kakashi looked out, into the darkness. The fog hung heavy in the air, moving closer. “Which is why I still don't understand what Akatsuki's doing. They _had_ the Jinchuuriki right there, right in front of them, and chose an asset over their goal. There's two explanations: either Orochimaru had something of greater value to the masked man or–”

Someone screamed, and both men started. The fog moved closer, and Kakashi squinted. The wind was pushing in the opposite direction that the fog was moving. Beside him, Asuma spat out a burst of ash. It collided with the fog and exploded in a cloud of fire. Kakashi turned to sound the retreat when the fire condensed, dissipating.

“What the fu–”

The sky exploded, flames filling the cool night air.

* * *

Tsunade walked into HQ with the Yondaime Tsuchikage, unsure about the state of affairs. The room was large, with a deep recess in the middle of it. In the recess, a large water globe hung in the air, a detection barrier that spread out over a good size of the continent. Deeper into the room, away from the windows, a massive comms unit sat, three people tied into it. By the windows, at the large table, the Raikage sat with several of the Jinchuuriki. If she hadn't known any better, she would've thought it was an intensely informal gokage summit.

She glanced at everyone, seeing the little details about their health – the Raikage's elevated heart rate, restlessness, way he sat straight in his chair (muscle training leaving a lack of spinal flexibility, Raiton affinity augmenting nerves affecting them, supercharging neurons and reacting negatively to any lack of movement); Shikaku glancing from document to document, studying every little detail from the war front (nervous, putting all his energy into reaction of the enemy actions and prediction of battle tactics); the Raikage's secretary, Mabui, standing stiffly at his side (concerned, not enough muscle tone to suggest she was out in the field very often, but hands having the callouses of regular jutsu use). And the Jinchuuriki...

Tsunade frowned. Something wasn't right, was nagging at her senses. Everything was there, from the callouses to the musculature to the little facial twitches. But still, something wasn't right.

“Hokage.” Ay tilted his head in greeting, and Yagura glanced up from the documents on the table. Ay's gaze shifted, sharply nodding at Kitsuchi. “My deepest condolences.”

Kitsuchi squared his shoulders, his eyes hard. “Our funerary rites will be observed when the war has ended. It has been half a century since Iwagakure had to follow the protocols.”

Ay nodded. “The protocols are the same anywhere in the Elemental Nations. Mabui can draw up copies when this is over.”

“Shikaku too,” Tsunade offered, and the Nara glanced over at her irritatedly. He may gripe about unnecessary workloads, but she knew that he would help. She sighed. “So, has the Ambush Squad been informed of the new intel?”

“They have,” Chiyo said, returning to the table. By the comms unit, Naruto, Roshi, Utakata, and one of the guards were engaged in a heated card game. Fuu and Gaara were in the far corner, silent. Tsunade felt like they were watching her, observing everything they were doing. “We have mere hours before the masked man's hideout is discovered.”

“He won't go down easily,” Yagura said, voice short and clipped. He was angry, Tsunade knew. The masked man had stolen away more than a decade of his life; anyone would be angry in that situation. Still...

“We'll have to be smart about this,” Tsunade said, nodding at Shikaku. “What have you gotten from what we know?”

“I wouldn't advise attacking in his territory,” Shikaku sighed. “It's better if we lure him into our area.” He tapped the map. “Here. It's a peat bog two kilometers southwest of Yugakure. It's got enough forestry to keep our people from getting trapped, but it can slow the masked man down if he hits the bog. The area naturally has a thick fog so application of the kirigakure jutsu won't make him realize he's heading into a trap. The fog will obscure his vision, and jamming jutsu will obscure our Shinobi from his Sharingan. Once he's in there, we've got the war won. The main issue will be–”

“News from the battlefront!” Inoichi called. “New enemies have appeared among Kakashi's battalion! Corrosive fog and extensive mastery over Katon jutsu have been displayed by two of them.”

“More news!” Tenga cried. “Reports are saying that... Jinchuuriki have appeared in the battlefront!”

Tsunade felt her blood run cold. “What?!”

“They...” Tenga hesitated. “So far they've identified Katashi Hikaru and Arata Kenshin.”

“Update!” Inoichi interrupted. “One of the enemies has been identified; a former Iwa-Nin by the name of Raito Kouga.”

Ay cursed, and Tsunade wondered who that person was, wondered how dangerous this was getting. “How many total?”

Down in the recess, Ao's brow furrowed. After a moment, he went white. “There are nine enemies. Four on the coast, and five to the south.”

* * *

If Kakashi hadn't known better, he'd have presumed that the fire had never stopped. The entire world was pit up in flame, and it was all they took to survive. The source of the flames was someone around Kakashi's age, dressed in the uniform of Taki. They created and manipulated fire with ease, turning attacks to their own will and sending the flames back on his platoon.

It certainly wasn't helped that anyone that could've stop the enemy was also engaged with Raito Kouga. Gai was engaged with Kouga, using every bit of his taijutsu to be on equal footing with the dangerous Jinchuuriki. Speaking of which...

Asuma led the assault against Ryota Akane, the source of the fog. She was tall and pale, dressed in a flowing flower kimono that hung off of her skeletal form. Akane wasn't alone, either, since there was also Kushina to consider. As in, the very much dead Uzumaki Kushina She was dressed for battle, wearing a flak jacket and her crimson hair tied behind her head in a ponytail. Golden chains flung out of her back, impaling anyone that tried to get too close.

Further back, Kakashi could see another person, dressed in the robes of a nomad from the Land of Wind. Atop the turban he wore, Kakashi could see a metal plate engraved with the symbol for Suna. The man raised an arm, the limb dripping with sand, and a wave of sand exploded out of the earth. Kakashi cursed, and felt the distant roar of thunder. He sent out another blast of fire, pushing as much as he could to make it the hottest he could, and hoped that it crystallized the sand into something that could be turned to their advantage.

The sand met the fire, and kept going. Kakashi cursed, putting his hands together for another blast of fire, when his original jutsu was added upon with a tunnel of wind. It stopped the sand, pushing it back and eating through the fog in their area. Temari landed beside him, staring down the undead Suna-nin. “Thanks.”

“Don't thank me, sir,” she replied, keeping her eyes on the enemy. “Heisuke Masaru. Once, he was the Jinchuuriki of the Shukaku.”

“So it seems,” Kakashi commented. He nodded at the others. “Recognize anyone else here?”

“I...” Temari faltered, shaking her head. “No, sir.”

“Raito Kouga.” He nodded at the severe-looking man Gai was fighting. “Founded the Explosion Corps in Iwa. Former Jinchuuriki of the Yonbi.” Another nod, to Akane “Ryota Akane, former Jinchuuriki of the Gobi.” Another nod, to Kushina. “Uzumaki Kushina, former Jinchuuriki, Kyuubi.”

“And the one tossing fire like he breathes it?” Temari asked, sending another wave of wind to combat Masaru's next wave. “I don't recognize them.”

“They're from Taki,” Kakashi said, tossing a Kunai at Masaru. A sand wall rose to protect him, even from the explosive tag Kakashi had wrapped around the hilt. “So they're likely the former Jinchuuriki of the Nanabi.”

Temari let out a breathy laugh, empty of humor. “Five Jinchuuriki. We're up against _five_ Jinchuuriki.”

“You'd rather be at the shores?” Kakashi asked. “I hear there's four Jinchuuriki attacking there.”

“Oh kami.” Temari's laugh sounded a bit more hysterical at that. “How are we still alive?”

“Well,” Kakashi began, a Chidori coming alive in his hand. “I find that determination not the die is really helpful.”

“With all due respect, sir,” Temari replied. “Fuck you.”

Kakashi grinned. “That's the spirit!”

He leaped forward, tossing a Kunai into the hand holding a Chidori. He couldn't throw the Kunai and expect it to keep the jutsu active; non-conductive metals generally only had about three seconds of maintaining the chakra nature being pumped into them before it either fizzled out or the Kunai exploded.

Kakashi was hoping for the explosion. Especially given that he was basically throwing a Chidori into Akane's face. Still, he was going to follow it up with another Kunai, this one with an explosive tag attached.

Chakra chains flew after him, and Kakashi tossed the Chidori-infused Kunai. Barely a second later, Kakashi tossed the second Kunai at Kushina as she focused her onslaught on him. The explosive tag went off too close for her to dodge, and Kakashi felt some satisfaction that it took out most of her head. There was also some guilt, because this was _Kushina_ , but he'd long since moved past feeling anything like that. The dead were dead, and this jutsu was just plain offensive. Resting spirits should never be disturbed from their slumber.

The Chidori-infused Kunai hit the sand wall defending Akane, and the sand...

_Huh._

Kakashi blinked in surprise as the sand absorbed the Chidori, cracking into a lightning shape as it burned to glass. The glass cracked and fell away, and Kakashi would have prepared another Chidori, but Kushina had lunged, physically attacking him. She fought like Naruto, all fists and raw power, but with none of the careful precision that Gai had learned. Kakashi watched as she regenerated, every part of her a blackened ash. Her skin even had the ashen look of a dead person.

On a whim, he sent another burst of fire at Kushina, and she countered with a Suiton jutsu, drawn from the fog in the air. The water was evaporated into the air, dried out as it took out the fire, and made the air feel so dry it hurt Kakashi's throat.

The battlefield got cast into shadow, dark clouds hiding the moon from view. Kakashi heard the rumble of thunder, and got an idea. He clicked on his radio, calling to the entire battalion. “Heard the Jinchuuriki together! Use all the fire you can, dry out the air and burn up this fog. I'm ending this now!”

Kushina leaped at him, golden chains springing out of her back, and Kakashi cursed as he saw a sand wall blocking his only means of retreat. A torrent of wind sent Kushina reeling, crashing into the ground and toward where Akane and Masaru were standing. That was three together, and Kakashi needed a little more time. He spotted several Iwa-Nin use the Earth Splitter jutsu in tandem, lifting a huge chunk of land and sending the undead Taki Jinchuuriki tumbling– no, no they were... flying. Two small flames were coming out of their fists and propelled them into the air.

Kakashi took a moment to thank the heavens that Naruto hadn't gotten anything like that.

He turned to stare at Temari, then back at the flying Jinchuuriki, then back at Temari. “...so they can fly.”

“ _Kyosei Sen_ ,” the radio supplied. Ah, Inoichi. Such a wise, wise person. “ _First Jinchuuriki of the Nanabi. Died... either by the hand of the Nidaime Tsuchikage or the Nidaime Mizukage._ ”

A monstrous person killed by two monstrous people. Of course.

“So,” Kakashi began, gesturing at the flying Jinchuuriki. “Do you have any ideas of how to bring him back to the ground?”

Temari glared. Kakashi was unfazed. Temari opened her mouth. “Again, fuck you.” She added, “With all due respect.”

“Still,” Kakashi said. “He is flying, and maybe you could get together with all the other Futon users. Create a tornado or something to smother his flames. Actually,” Kakashi amended, “don't do that. It's about to rain so... is anyone from Kiri listening in?” Kakashi clicked on the radio. “Or anyone with a suiton affinity, really. Target the flying guy and get him down with the others.”

He clicked the radio off before the battalion could curse him out for that. Temari stared him down, unimpressed. “You're an awful person.”

“I do try,” Kakashi glibly replied. Above them, thunder cracked. He clicked the radio back on. “Gai?”

“ _My rival!_ ” The radio sang. Kakashi sighed.

“Hit him hard. Maybe aim for him to hit the flying guy.”

“ _Yosh!_ ”

Kakashi clicked the radio back off. He saw how Temari was staring at him, and shrugged. “It gets results.”

Temari shook her head as Kyosei Sen was subjected to getting hit with Raito Kouga, the two of them falling to the ground where the other Jinchuuriki had been herded. He nodded, pleased, and clicked the radio back on. “Retreat to the secondary line immediately! Grab anyone injured and hightail it out of here _ASAP_!”

He tossed the comm pack at Temari, who caught it with a cry. She looked from it to him, confused. “Sir?”

“You should run too.” Kakashi felt his hand crackle with electricity as he channeled a bit of Raiton chakra into it. “Remember the big explosion of lightning earlier today?”

Temari went pale, and nodded. She put on the comm pack, and ran. Kakashi ran too, in the opposite direction. He climbed up the pillar of ground pulled up by the Earth Splitter, and felt every bit of the storm above them. The lightning felt like an extension of his arm, and Kakashi only needed to twitch his fingers for all of it to condense into a singular entity. It took the shape of a dragon, massive and imposing, and came together with a deafening boom of thunder.

“JINCHUURIKI!” Kakashi yelled through the dull ringing of his ears. He raised his hand high. “DIE AGAIN!”

Kakashi slashed his hand down, like he was starting a match. There was an explosion of light, and the last thing he remembered was the sensation of flying.

* * *

Suigetsu cackled as he spun Kabutowari by its rope. Now _this_ was a battle!

To recap, Orochimaru had brought back some of the most fun people to ever come out of Kirigakure.

And there were also Jinchuuriki from other places, but he didn't care about them as much. A guy that could turn into a wraith and a guy who could wield suiton jutsu like he was a Hozuki (or better than a Hozuki, since he didn't even liquify when he started to take control of the ocean) weren't as much fun as Kaguya Kuroda and Katashi Hikaru. Kuroda was the very first person to have the Shikyomatso, the progenitor of the Kaguya clan. She was where they got it from, every jutsu and battle movement and every bit of their Kekkei Genkai. Hikaru was different, having the ability to turn into lightning and move through everything that ever conducted electricity.

Basically, they were two of the most dangerous, most ruthless monsters to ever come out of Kiri. And both were there for Suigetsu to cut them to pieces. First he'd gotten to battle his older brother and collect almost all the seven swords, and now he got to test his mettle against these monsters.

Best day _ever_.

Suigetsu cleaved a tidal wave apart, the happiest he'd been since apprenticing under Hoshigaki Kisame. Climbing atop the broken wave, Suigetsu let his feet melt into the water, connecting with it and turning it into a massive pillar to gaze down at the battlefield. He could see the Raiton web that Hikaru made out of all the metal weapons, and saw how well the girl with Shibuki was doing against him. It still irked him how good someone from Konoha was with one of the seven swords, but he could see the appeal. Maybe he could convince her to defect.

 _...nah._ That sounded like too much work. Easier to just chop her to bits and steal the sword back. He was already planning on doing the same thing to Chojuro and Kisame when he found them. Then he could hand pick the absolute best, the most ruthless killers alive to be his swordsmen.

...was still a damn shame though. He actually liked this woman.

The water pillar shuddered, and Suigetsu felt his control over it waver. He glared down at the guy responsible, and with barely a flicker of thought the pillar collapsed down on the asshole.

Of course, this backfired since now the guy was taking control of all the water and forming a massive sphere around Suigetsu. In response, Suigetsu cleaved his way out with Kabutowari, switching out in midair for the Kiba. Suiton was always weak against Raiton, and it was better to level out the playing field so he could get back to killing Hikaru and Kuroda.

He spun in the air, charging the Kiba. Lightning crackled, and Suigetsu felt himself thrum with the sensation of his chakra becoming Raiton The remnants of the ocean fell back to earth, the broken prison dissolving back into the rest of the sea. The tidal surge dug into the coast, crumbling the defensive barriers. Screams of terror were silenced the same as the campfires. Suigetsu brought the Kiba together in a downward slash. The sky was brought alight and filled with the boom of thunder. Steam filled the air, and Suigetsu blinked through multicolored stars. He laughed, big and loud, taking massive breaths that heaved his chest. Below him, the broken pieces of the enemy sloshed in the water. They slithered together, rebuilding into a single person. Suigetsu turned away, finding the prospect of battling the guy boring. There was no point to it, since he'd already killed the guy once.

Deeper inland, Suigetsu prepared the Kiba for battle. He loosened his wrists, spinning the twinswords. Movement charged them, and they crackled with electricity. The Kiba were the only way he could battle a monster like Katashi Hikaru, who could become Raiton No one could replicate his ability, and by the time he had been created, Kiri had made edicts forbidding Jinchuuriki from procreating. Jinchuuriki like Hikaru were condemned to celibate lives, and some had taken to it gladly, Hikaru included. Suigetsu could see the appeal of a life without sex (he couldn't understand the concept of sex appeal that others had discussed, much less how sex could be so important) but the lost opportunity for a clan that could become Raiton was a damn shame.

A bolt of lightning traveled across the ground, going across every bit of metal in a deadly web. Bodies littered the ground, burnt and charred. The lightning traveled from metal to metal, from Kunai to Shuriken to katanas and more, anything that conducted electricity was used.

“Whaaaaaaat?” A lean figure, and tall, taller even than Kisame. Crimson hair surrounded wide eyes, and a mouth full of pointed teeth grinned wide. Katashi Hikaru was a monster the world had never seen before, and never would have seen again, had he not been resurrected. “Those wouldn't be– oh but they are, they are! The Kiba!”

Suigetsu grinned. “Naturally someone from Kiri would keep their lips loose. Those other guys are too quiet. They don't even scream when you cut into them.”

Hikaru grinned. “They refused. Boss couldn't be having with that. Stuck some Seal in their heads, made 'em all _boring_. Not at all like the one he put in mine. All's I got to do is kill all you guys and I get the freedom to do what I want. Never even thought I'd get to kill the se–”

The girl with Shibuki sliced through Hikaru, the edge exploding the undead's torso into bits. Suigetsu frowned. “What the hell! That was my kill!”

The girl frowned as well. “It doesn't matter who took him down, just that he's down. Finally.”

“It doesn't matter girl!” Suigetsu protested. “What's worse, you took my sword!”

“The name's Tenten,” the girl bit back. “And this sword is mine by right.”

“The Shibuki isn't deserving of being wielded by someone who ain't from Kiri,” Suigetsu said hotly. The ground exploded in a burst of lightning, Hikaru reforming from the electricity. “Oh good. You're not dead.”

“Silly Hozuki,” Hikaru replied, his body taking shape. “I did die. I'm dead right now. And ain't that the worst kinda thing. Can't feel the rush of adrenaline or the beat of my heart. Ain't get no joy from the kill. But that don't mean the kill ain't fun!”

Hikaru lunged, and Suigetsu swung the Kiba in his left hand, the tip of the Kiba in his right hand digging into the earth. He was grounded, letting Hikaru pass through him with little more than a slight sting in his wrists. The ground beneath him exploded, with Hikaru staring them down with an irritated gaze and a frown. “That's no good, no good at all. But...” A sly grin spread across his face. “Always wanted to kill one of the swordsmen.”

Suigetsu dislodged the Kiba from the ground, giving Hikaru a sweeping bow. “Flattery will get you a good second death.”

He dashed forward, the Kiba flying in a deadly crosscut that Suigetsu meant to kill. He knew it wouldn't, knew that Hikaru would dodge. Like affinities canceled out, and to Hikaru, the Kiba were swords more deadly than any other weapon would ever be. To Hikaru, anything charged with Raiton were the deadliest weapons in the world.

Hikaru leaped back, dodging like Suigetsu predicted. The commander – Suigetsu probably should get the guy's name, just so he could know what to call the guy when he killed him dead – leaped in with a cutting slash that nearly decapitated Hikaru. Suigetsu growled as Hikaru turned back into Raiton, vanishing back into his web. “What the hell, asshole! This one's mine!”

“Sorry,” the commander apologized, not sounding at all apologetic. “But we can't afford to let anyone go one-on-one with these monsters.”

“Like hell,” Suigetsu retorted. “Tell me your name, bastard, so I know what to call your body.”

“Darui,” the commander replied, blocking Suigetsu's slash. “We aren't enemies.”

“Aren't friends, either,” Suigetsu replied. “But... if you keep interfering, _fine_. I still get to beat the shit out of these monsters, help or no.”

“Good.” Darui broke away, jerking his head. A squirrel-looking guy and a mousy guy appeared. The squirrel-looking guy seemed familiar, and Suigetsu tilted his head. “You a Katashi?”

The guy sneered at Suigetsu. “Katashi Daichi. I detest having to work with such creatures as you, but needs must.”

Suigetsu didn't like the guy. He didn't much care for how the guy was related to Hikaru, only that the bastard knew how to fight. He pointed one of the Kiba at Daichi. “You, I'm gonna kill all slow.”

“Like you could do anyth–” Daichi was cut off as a bolt of lightning blasted through his torso. A hole burned through Daichi, and he fell to the ground. Suigetsu blocked the lightning in a cross guard, the Raiton forming back into Hikaru.

“Maaaaaaaan,” Hikaru drawled. “Killing my lil nephew wasn't fun at aaaaaaaall. But maybe, maybe killing you will be better.”

Suigetsu grinned, all sharp teeth. “Bring your worst.”

* * *

 

“Hozuki Suigetsu continues to aid the coastal battlefront,” Inoichi said. “He and commander Darui are engaging Katashi Hikaru in battle. Kaguya Kuroda, Arata Kenshin, and Tsubasa Noboru remain free.”

“Word from the southern front,” Tenga called out. “Commander Hatake managed to slow the combined Jinchuuriki with a massive-scale jutsu. Reports say that he had the troops create a storm, and he took control of the lightning and brought it down on the enemy. Hatake was found alive, and is being moved to the forward medical base. Temari from Suna has taken control of the front in his absence, and leads the continued effort against the Jinchuuriki.”

Tsunade frowned at how calmly everyone sounded. It didn't matter that they remained in control of the situation, there was still something off. She couldn't put a finger on what it was, couldn't pin it down, and it kept nagging at her.

Her gaze turned to the former Mizukage, Yagura. He remained beside Shikaku the entire time, eyes roaming across every piece of intel and every platoon deployment. All the Jinchuuriki had remained quiet, kept obedient.

And still it nagged. Something both foreign and familiar that nagged at her memory.

Out of habit, Tsunade took in the medical status of everyone in the room. She was good enough to make a decent guess of it, and the majority of the time she got it right. Ay was jumpy as ever. Shikaku was stressed – the effects of a soldier pill; she doubted any of them would be getting much rest in the coming days. Chiyo looked lively, and entirely healthy for her age. Kitsuchi and Kurotsuchi looked exhausted, but were clearly toughing it out. And Yagura...

Tsunade stilled. Her gaze focused in on–

“Princess?” Jiraiya startled her out of her thoughts, and she blinked in confusion. What had she been thinking about?

Tsunade glared at her teammate. “What?”

“I've been thinking,” Jiraiya began. “About Orochimaru.”

“Yeah?” Tsunade nodded, recalling the battle. “What's your point?”

“He didn't have his sword,” Jiraiya said. “You know the one.”

Tsunade nodded, mind running through dozens of scenarios. “You believe that was why the masked man went after him?”

“I'd bet on it.” Jiraiya nodded. “But I don't understand why, though.”

“What is so special about Orochimaru's sword?” Ay asked.

“Orochimaru always said that the Kusanagi was a sacred relic of a time long past,” Jiraiya began, ever the storyteller. Tsunade canted her head in allowing him to explain. He had a better way with words than he ever cared to admit. “From long before the time of chakra. It was a sword that once felled a god, he said. Legend had that it was part of a great ritual to awaken this god, half of a key to unlock the god's cage.”

“Legend has no place here,” Chiyo said. “Gods do not die, and they do not come to Earth.”

Jiraiya nodded. “The Juubi was a legend itself. And we're fighting to stop it from coming back. There's a Seal that Summons the Shinigami, a god itself. There's nothing to say this legend doesn't have some grain of truth.”

“That still doesn't explain why the masked man would concern himself over a legend that predates the Juubi,” Tsunade pointed out.

“Who knows what Madara's plan is,” Yagura pointed out, sparing them a glance as he muttered something to Shikaku.

“Lady Hokage.” Mabui approached with a medic-nin. She had dark hair and thick arms and messy hair tied back. “This is Tatsuki, Kumo's head medic. She's performed the autopsy on Hoshigaki Kisame.”

“The real one, sir.” Tatsuki saluted Tsunade, then held out a thick file. “As well as the imposter. It's all in my report.”

Tsunade flipped through the pages, waving a hand at Tatsuki. “Written reports can only tell so much. How about you sum it up for everyone that isn't a medic here, huh?”

“Of course, sir,” Tatsuki replied. “Very little was found on Hoshigaki's real body, with the exception of a ring on his left ring finger. Our cypher corps studied the material and found it to be an organic chakra receiver.”

“Organic?” Tsunade glanced at Inoichi. He would know more, but tied into the comms like he was, there was nothing for him to include. “Substance?”

“Carbonized bone.” Tatsuki stood stiff, and Tsunade wondered what it was about all Kumo-Nin that they were so formal. “But beyond that we have no further understanding. The imposter body, however...”

“What about it?” Tsunade asked, flipping to the report. “Did you discover how it mimicked the chakra signature?”

“Yes,” Tatsuki replied. “It didn't.”

Tsunade's eyes sharpened. “It didn't?”

“It _was_ Hoshigaki's chakra, not an imitation.” Tatsuki almost shook her head, and Tsunade sighed.

“At ease.” Tatsuki slumped in relief, and nodded. Tsunade sighed, rubbing at her forehead. This was why she preferred working in a hospital than in her office of the Hokage. It was much more informal. “And the body? Not a conventional body double?”

“Not at all,” Tatsuki explained. “I was baffled because the DNA wasn't at all a match between the double and the original, but while studying the internal make up, the body... well, it changed.”

“Changed?” Tsunade glared down at the report. “How?”

“I only have theories.” Tatsuki glanced at the report in Tsunade's hands. “But on a hunch I cross-referenced with the reports coming in from the field medics. The body double was a White Zetsu.”

Tsunade gaped, staring at the report in shock. A White Zetsu? “How?”

“That would explain some field reports on the combat abilities of White Zetsu,” Shikaku said, looking up from the reports. He picked up a scroll and handed it over. “They latched onto people and sucked on the chakra. It's possible that they could use it to–”

“Copy someone's appearance,” Tsunade finished, glaring down at the report. From a tactical standpoint, it was absolutely brilliant, and just as brutal. She supposed the plan was for the White Zetsu to infiltrate the ranks and cripple the Joint Alliance from within, but that didn't seem to be the case. If anything, it felt like something underutili–

On reflex, Tsunade leaped over the table and threw a punch at Yagura. The former Mizukage dodged, leaping back, and Tsunade switched targets, sending a Bee. Ay got between her and her target, deflecting her kick.

“Are you mad?!” Ay screamed, the entire room going on guard. Tsunade pulled away, standing on the table and glaring down at each of the Jinchuuriki.

“I am Senju Tsunade, the greatest medic in the Elemental Nations,” she said coldly. “Did you really believe this farce could stand against me, imposters?”

“What are you talking about?” Chiyo cried.

Tsunade nodded at the reports. “We've been operating without all the details. The only witness to Hoshigaki's death was Killer Bee. And the only ones to witness his second death were the Jinchuuriki. Madara has a space-time jutsu that allows him to transport himself or anyone around him. It would be simple for him to replace the fallen Jinchuuriki with doubles. The field report says the White Zetsu are have the DNA of my grandfather. It stands to reason that their native chakra is based on him, and I remember what it felt like. And ever since I laid eyes on you, I've had the sense that I know your chakra. It's the Senju chakra that betrayed you. Not to mention,” Tsunade glared down at them all. “Yagura would never have indulged the masked man and called him Madara. The Ambush Squad is about to attack the Akatsuki HQ and we've got you on the defensive. Reveal yourselves, we've won.”

“But you've already lost.”

The entire room stilled at those words. No one moved. No one dared breathe. Outside, the last edges of the moon were blacked out as the eclipse began.

“It was laughably easy of course,” Utakata continued where Naruto had left off, raising a hand in a 'what-can-you-do' way.

“After all, with all these attacks going on everywhere at the same time, you couldn't possibly watch us.” All eyes moved towards Roshi, and a sense of dread overtook the Kage and various Shinobi.

“Or them, we should say.” This time it was Fu, who had a malevolent smirk on her face that just didn't belong. Without a word the Raikage was slamming the (supposed) Nanabi Jinchuuriki into the wall. The smirk didn't fade, instead it grew wider, more lopsided, as the tanned skin faded into a green-white, the entire body fading into that of a White Zetsu.

“It doesn't matter what you do to us,” Yagura said, turning into a White Zetsu. All around them, the Jinchuuriki morphed into White Zetsu. Ay watched, horrified, as his brother warped into the enemy.

“For the Unsealing has begun,” Naruto– no, not Naruto. The White Zetsu all grinned as one, even as Ay went around the room, snapping all their necks. His shoulders shook, body heaving as he tried to keep the anger controlled.

“Contact the Ambush Squad,” Ay commanded. “They have new orders: the rescue of the Jinchuuriki!”

* * *

Consciousness returned to Bee in the same way a bolt of lightning struck. He gasped, awake, and tried to move. Chains held him down and he glanced around to try to discover what was happening. The last he remembered was the massive water prison, and Hoshigaki Kisame transforming into a shark-like creature.

Looking around, Bee saw that he was in a massive hole in the ground, the red light of the moon casting dark shadows on everything. The moon itself was covered by an eclipse, nearly perfect.

 _ **Bee**_ , Hachibi whispered in the back of his mind. _**Look around you.**_

A glance at his surroundings revealed that he was between a pair of twins – the infamous Kin-Gin brothers – and a young woman he barely recognized as the Jinchuuriki of the Nanabi. Through the darkness, Bee saw that the other Jinchuuriki were there too, all of them bound and laid in a circle.

“So the Hachibi is the first to wake.” Bee twisted around to see a masked man, wielding a sword and a bottle of a dark liquid. The masked man approached the circle, crossing it and going to the center. Torches lit, and Bee saw the dark lines of a Seal crisscrossing the ground, tying all the Jinchuuriki together. The masked man laughed, dry and cold. “It seems you shall be awake for me to explain it all. I doubt you will live long enough to understand.”

“How can he?” Another person grew out of the earth, one half of their body a green-white, while the other half was a deathly black. “ **He's about to die anyway.** ”

The masked man tilted his head, and Bee saw the glow of a red right eye. “What is about to happen is the Unsealing of a god. Here is the great Seal, redone in the very position the relics holding the Yamata no Orochi reside.”

“Yamata no Orochi?” Bee repeated, baffled. 

“Otherwise known as the Hachibi no Hachimata. The eight-headed serpent.” The masked man undid the bottle, letting the liquid drip over the sword. “The creatures Sealed within all of you are but pieces of a greater whole. The Juubi.”

Hachibi shrieked, and Bee pushed through the noise to ask, “The Juubi? What lie this be.”

“No lies,” the masked man said. He raised the sword. “No more. With the Kusanagi sword of the Yagami clan, smeared with the blood of an acolyte of Jashin, and the chakra loosed into the world by the Yamata no Orochi, the very chakra that formed the Juubi, the Seal is undone. The Biju, the true Biju, will awaken with the cry of the Orochi.”

The eclipse blacked out the world, and the masked man stabbed the sword into the center of the Seal. Red lightning arced out of the circle, the Seal activating. The masked man laughed, leaping away with his companion. Under the light of the Seal, Bee saw a pale man with long black hair watching from the far end of the room. 

The masked man cackled. “The Biju live again!”

Bee screamed. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. I've had this planned for the last three years, and there will be a sequel, a direct follow-up to the ending. Expect a double-update of Chapter 49 with Chapter 48, as I've had 49 written up for the past nine months. To tide you over, the next chapter should be considerably shorter and come much faster. As a gift, here's the titles of the final three chapters of Lucidity, as we begin our dive into the sequel, Jinchuuriki. 
> 
> Chapter 48: Eclipse  
> Chapter 49: The Life of Death  
> Chapter 50: The Death of Death


	48. Eclipse

The Jinchuuriki's screaming died down, and Izuna watched the array with satisfaction. Nagato's one surviving eye (the only one Izuna had managed to retrieve) felt heavy in his head, and with it Izuna could see every detail of the Seal and understand how it worked.

Beside him, Zetsu and the false Orochimaru stood, impassive. In the hands of the false Orochimaru was a lock of hair with bits of scalp clinging to it. "Are you prepared?"

Izuna nodded. To the side, the Gin-Kin brothers disintegrated, falling apart as their chakra was taken from them. What was left behind was the sacrificial bodies, half-buried in ash. "It has been nearly a century since I saw my brother last. Nearly a century since I last slept." He sighed, weary and giddy at the same time. "Do we have a sacrifice?"

Out of the shadows, a pair of White Zetsu brought out the bound Yakushi Kabuto. The false Orochimaru nodded as they brought him to them. "It seems fitting that a spy with no identity should be sacrificed for Madara's return." He pulled out a scroll, the paper unfurling. "This will use the last of the chakra. Once it has started, I will cease to be Orochimaru."

" **The Edo Tensei will not be undone** ," Black Zetsu added. " **Are we certain that the returned Jinchuuriki should roam so free?** "

"Undoing the jutsu at this time would break the misdirection we have placed upon the world," Izuna said. The false Orochimaru set the scroll on the ground, bunching the scalp in his fist. He slammed it in the middle of the scroll. Black lines bled onto the ground, curling around Kabuto. The ground around him sizzled and burned, turning to ash that flooded around Kabuto. Kabuto's skin began to burn as well, breaking down into ash. The pain broke the genjutsu, and for a moment he began to scream as his life was sacrificed. As soon as it began, his scream was silenced, the ash forming into a larger human shape.

White Zetsu twitched, tilting his head. "The decoys have been spotted and destroyed. And an ambush squad is heading this way."

"How far out?"

White Zetsu grinned. "Too far. Half an hour."

Izuna glanced at the figure. Long Dark hair fell haphazard over armor that glinted black in the dark. Red sharingan glowed out of blackened eyes, falling upon an ashen face. Izuna grinned, reaching up to take off the mask. "It's been a long time... Madara."

* * *

 

Naruto woke to a white expanse, painfully bright. He groaned, sitting up and covering his eyes with an arm. The shade, however scant, allowed his eyes to adjust to the brightness.

It was a white void, blank and bright everywhere he saw. Naruto wasn't entirely sure that he was on anything, as there was no way to tell flat land apart from the expanse.

"Kurama?" he called into the void, and nothing called back, not even his voice. The absence of sound was loud to him. He became aware of the movement of his clothes, every breath he took, even the faint buzz in his ears trying to compensate for the lack of background noise.

"Kurama?" he called again.

"Who's Kurama?"

Naruto whirled, coming face to face with... "Holy shit."

Sasuke looked exactly like Naruto remembered, his blue shirt torn and his hair in desperate need of cutting. He looked smaller than Naruto, and when the blond stood, he saw that Sasuke was well over a head shorter than him. "You're..."

"Thirteen, yes." Sasuke nodded. "You never saw me when I was older, so it was decided that I should look the way you last saw me."

What the hell? "The hell is wrong with you?" The Sasuke Naruto remembered was never that polite. "You're not Sasuke."

The not-Sasuke tilted his head, considering. "You're half-right. I am him, and I am not."

"The hell is that supposed to mean?" Naruto was beginning to feel irritated, and wondered if maybe this was Sasuke after all. His anger faded as he stepped closer, and became aware of how much younger Sasuke was. "You're so young."

"Maybe you've gotten old," Not-Sasuke wondered. He shook his head. "You never kept your promise."

Naruto, stricken, glanced away. "Things got complicated."

"No they didn't," Not-Sasuke said. "You just don't want to admit that they were right to do what they did."

"I'm not angry about that anymore," Naruto protested, but his anger was empty.

Not-Sasuke looked at him sadly. "You keep lying to yourself. It's so unlike you."

The pity in his voice ignited a spark of anger deep inside Naruto, a well-spring of envy that he'd forgotten he had. "Shut up."

"Did you even apologize to Sakura for failing to bring me back?" Not-Sasuke – no, Sasuke wondered, still giving Naruto that pitiable look. "Or that promise to become Hokage? What happened to that? What happened to _you_?"

"Things got complicated." Naruto repeated. "I grew up."

"You gave up," Sasuke corrected. "When did you stop being you?"

"When did you die?" Naruto countered, feeling the hot sting of tears.

"When did you?" Sasuke asked.

"I'm not dead!" Naruto snarled, blinking away the tears. Anger was something familiar, something he knew how to deal with.

"You're _here_ , aren't you?" Sasuke countered, and Naruto stopped. He was there, was without Kurama, could feel a growing emptiness deep within him that wasn't there before. And maybe it was true, maybe he was dying, but...

"You still aren't real."

At this, Sasuke smiled, grim and sharp. It was naggingly familiar, and Naruto felt his stomach curdle. "I'm real."

"You aren't Sasuke." He trusted his instincts, trusted that whatever this thing was, it wasn't anything good.

"I have his form," Sasuke replied. "I have his memories. Who's to say I am not him?"

"Me," Naruto felt himself say. "I don't feel like punching you in the face. I always felt like punching Sasuke in the face, so you aren't him."

"Observant." Sasuke tilted his head. "You're scared of me."

"Are you saying I shouldn't?"

"I am saying you're right to fear me." Sasuke's grin widened, his teeth growing sharper and blacker. "You really should have apologized to your teammate. Sasuke was never to return to Konoha."

Naruto's skin crawled. "You don't know that."

Sasuke's grin vanished. His skin began to warp, bulging and falling and tearing away. "Don't presume to know what I know. Uchiha Sasuke was never to return to Konoha. His death was to always happen young. **The gods cannot be defied so easily.** "

The Shinigami was just as menacing as Naruto remembered, just as chilling and just as cruel. It seemed even to become taller, looming largely over him as it did the last time they crossed paths. Naruto swallowed, dryly. "So this is it."

" **This is not when you were to die.** " The Shinigami tilted its head. " **Someone outside of my purview is changing the course of history.** "

Naruto shivered as the world tilt-shifted. All around him the other Jinchuuriki appeared, just as unnerved as he was. Yagura remained composed enough to talk. "What do you mean? Uchiha Madara?"

" **Uchiha Madara is dead.** " The Shinigami tilted its head. " **However, the interloper has performed the cursed jutsu, as you call it, to return him to the living world.** "

"Edo Tensei," Yagura snarled.

* * *

Madara found himself face to face with Zetsu, _his_ Zetsu, both black and white. He frowned, disliking the lack of heartbeat. A glance at his arms showed the ashen skin, cracked and deadened. "This is..."

"Tobirama's accursed jutsu," a masked individual said, his voice achingly familiar to Madara. The figure reached up, loosening the mask and taking it off. "The Edo Tensei."

Madara noticed the man's left eye through the mask. "The Rinnegan. A myth."

The man gestured at the massive Seal. "The Great Seal of the Yamata no Orochi. It took decades to find, and longer still to gather the necessary items needed to unlock it. The Biju, the _real_ Biju, will awake with its cry."

Madara scowled. "Who are you?"

The mask fell away. "It has been a long time, brother."

"Izuna!" Madara started, then snarled. His Sharingan whirled in his eyes. "What is the meaning of this?!"

"My ocular power," Izuna said, tossing the mask aside. "It allowed me to transfer into one of your White Zetsu. I have spent the past century cultivating their cells, creating more, with the aid of your Black Zetsu. I have brought you back, and with the Rinnegan, I can–"

"Die again." Madara plunged a hand into Izuna's chest. His Sharingan whirled, twisting and warping into the Mangekyo. "Uchiha Izuna died long ago. I grieved his passing and wore his eyes to my death. Whatever you believe yourself to be is but a mere shadow."

His other arm shot out, stabbing Zetsu in the chest. Madara absorbed Zetsu in a moment, both halves returning to him. He barely spared a second glance at the second White Zetsu, setting it ablaze within Amaterasu. Bringing his focus back to Izuna, he found the false sibling staring at him in horror. "Brother, why?"

"Do not call me brother," Madara snarled. "I have no siblings left alive."

"I–" Izuna choked, trying to breath as he became desiccated, an empty husk of the person he was before. Madara pulled his hand out and let the body fall.

"It seems you were not fully one of mine," Madara coldly said, turning away from the body. A flick of the wrist sent a fire jutsu upon the body, burning it to ash. "But whatever plan you were plotting, you will never see it to fruition."

* * *

"Why are you here, talking to us?" Yagura asked. "Why not stop the interloper yourself? Why not stop Madara?"

"If we're already dead," Utakata said. "Then why aren't you letting us move on?"

" **There are events happening in the living world that require intervention,** " the Shinigami stated. It reached one spindly finger up to tap against the blade between its teeth. " **A prophecy that must be completed.** "

"The new Sage," Yagura said. "It's one of us isn't it. Your replacement"

He didn't phrase it like a question. Naruto didn't like that, liked it even worse when the Shinigami chuckled. " **You are smart, for a human. The prophecy does not speak of my replacement. It speaks of my return. The return of the Sage, not the creation of a new one.** "

"What." Naruto stared blankly between the two, looking at the others for any indication that they understood what was being said any more than him. They all looked just as lost as him, and it made the dark pit in his gut heavier and emptier.

"In the Uzumaki compound I found an old story," Yagura began. "Of the beginning of the Uchiha, the Senju, and the Uzumaki. It spoke of an individual who traveled the lands, spreading knowledge. It told of how one day a great evil appeared, and how he defeated it. It told of how he had two sons, and chose to entrust his will, everything that he had stood for, every hope to lead the world to peace, to the younger brother. The older brother felt slighted, felt jealous of how he merely had inherited the raw power of his father. The two brothers fought, clashing together again and again, as it continued with their descendents. The younger brother's descendents became the Senju, and later the Uzumaki as well. The older brother became the Uchiha. And the father became a purple-skinned creature with horns."

" **My legacy,** " the Shinigami tilted its head in acknowledgment. " **And the beginning of the age of your Shinobi. But that is not the story I speak of. There is more to this tale than even you mortals would ever find in your archives. It is a tale of my beginning. Listen closely, and listen well.** "


	49. The Origin

There lived a Sage, his name long lost to time, but he was born a farmer's boy, in a land far to the West.

As a young child, this Sage was special, able work his body beyond the limits afforded to him. He could run faster than anyone else, was easily as strong as a grown man, and when he tended to the crops, they grew far greater and produced a far more bountiful harvest than when anyone else tended to them.

His village, recognizing that his power was special, sent the child away, to learn how to utilize this power he had with the monks far to the north. With only instructions, the child set out, moving further and further East. Head toward the sunrise, he had been told, until the land gives away to the saltwater ocean. Once there, he should turn north, and follow the sea until he finds the ruins of an ancient dynasty. The ones who will greet the boy will become his teachers.

So the boy traveled, moving across the land, toward the sunrise, and the far off saltwater ocean. He crossed a desert and various forests, scaled mountains and marsh alike. The boy met others, people of varied sizes and skins, and their ways. The monks were the most constant, the ones of wind and fire, who stood resolute over dark things they dare not speak of. Ancient evil, they told him, best left forgotten to the world.

He crossed a desert, found a tree of immense size and caverns with no end to their depths. He found many friends and learned many things. The world was far larger than he had previously believed it to be. It took many months, but eventually the boy made it to the saltwater ocean. The ports he came to were lively, full of fishermen and traders and explorers all. Attempts to barter passage north had all failed, as every sailor the boy met had sworn that the seas were too volatile, laden with hidden mountains just beneath the roiling surface that shattered hulls to pieces. The boy would have to travel by land, along the coast.

The coast was long, and hard, and unforgiving. Storms rattled at the shore, raising walls of water to collapse against the beaches and cliffs, sending sharp needles of freezing rainwater against the boy as he traveled. The further north he moved, the less people there were, the shorter the days became, the colder the wind bit at any piece of exposed skin. For weeks he traveled north, against ice and rain and worse, and gradually everything became thicker, larger in scale.

What few villages the boy came across were long abandoned, ruins of stone and rotted metal that rested where once there must have been vast cities. None of them, however, were the ruins that he was seeking. Food was scarce enough, with whatever groves the ancient cities once harvested having long since been consumed by the forest. Water was almost the same, had it not been for the abundance of rivers and streams that he'd encountered in his travels north.

Fruits were the scarcest, but hunting... hunting the boy was quick to learn. Grubs and earthworms were the easiest to catch, and the gnawing pain of starvation was quick to squash whatever ill taste he encountered. Food was food was food, however and wherever he got it. Berries he dared not touch, for fear of picking from a poisonous plant, and fish were scarce enough even back in the lowlands. The farmer's spade he'd been gifted from his family became an instrument to hunt with, and soon he was learning how to be silent on his feet, how to move just so amongst the trees, across stretches of land, without giving away a sound. Speed and swiftness became necessity, and within days the boy became skilled enough to catch small animals. They were fast, and it was difficult, but it got easier as time went on.

Eventually the forest gave way, and all that was left to the boy was a flat expanse, as vast as the eye could see, and vaster still. The wind was harsh against the plains, and mountains loomed high above the clouds. The seashore was vanished, the sun hidden behind thick clouds. The silence of the vanished forest hung heavy in the air, replaced only with the faint sound of the wind. Steeling himself, the boy moved onwards, ever more north. Food in the plains was difficult to find, the grass growing tall in the wind and the only animals moving too swiftly for even the boy to capture. On the eve of his fifteenth day crossing the plains, the boy's food supply ran out.

His water lasted eight days longer than that.

With neither food nor water, the boy continued on regardless, the mountains slowly growing ever larger. After four days, the boy collapsed, and laid still. Gradually, the boy could feel a new source of energy filling him up, revitalizing him, giving him untold levels of strength. With it, he could cross vast distances in less time than before, although the energy source ran dangerously low within minutes of use.

He hunted, using this newly gotten speed, and caught the swift animals. Their meat was the most delicious he'd ever had, in the wake of starvation. Later, after he rested, the boy found that the energy source replenished when he ate and slept, and concluded that the energy was his energy. This power was his power. The energy source faded when he was physically tired, and again when he was mentally tired.

When he was too exhausted to even move, forced to remain still for long hours on end, the boy found that the energy naturally returned to him – although it felt different from the energy that came from within. To differentiate the two, he called his own energy Chakra, the life power that came from the blending of his physical and mental energies.

Twenty-two days after his water ran out, he reached the end of the plains. There was no forest, instead the mountains loomed high over him, and he found a stream. The water was freezing, and the boy found that the cold of winter was approaching, but it was more than enough.

With his water supply remade, the boy followed the stream back through the mountains, through storms and ice, to a massive structure, like the palaces the boy had heard in stories. He spotted creatures walking along the palace, on four legs and with many tails, and realized what they were: Kitsune.

Beyond the palace was a beach, and an ocean of endless sea, and it dawned on him that this was it, the end of his long journey. This was the ruins of the lost dynasty he was seeking.

He stumbled down the mountain, keeping track of the Kitsune – the stories he remembered of them told that they were among the wisest spirits to grace the earth, but also the most dangerous. The closer he got to the palace, the more he realized that it wasn't just a palace, but a city, huge and sprawling amidst the forest.

"Oh Kitsune, oh Kitsune," he called through the trees. "I have traveled far for your wisdom, and require your aid."

He found himself surprised at his voice, at how rough and how deep it was. The Kitsune in the city vanished in cracks of wood or the shadows of doors, fleeing from the sight and reach of the boy. He called for them to wait, for he had a power within himself that none could teach him to use. He called for their aid again and again, but still they vanished from sight and touch. Eventually he reached the castle, and called again. "Oh wise Kitsune, please teach me. For I have Chakra, and can use the energy of the earth. There are no humans who can teach me in its arts, and all I have spoken to have told me to seek this place."

The palace remained silent, and the boy, determined for an answer, gathered his Chakra and scaled the wall. Atop the wall he found an empty courtyard, and beside him stood several foxes, each with nine tails. A pure white one was closest, and it opened its mouth, asking where he came from.

The boy told them his tale, and how far he had come. He spoke of his findings, and how he came to name the energy within himself. The white fox listened, and while it said nothing, the boy could tell that it was talking to the others.

"I will travel with you, teaching you all I know," the white fox eventually responded. "But in exchange you will show me your homeland, and the entirety of the world. Your power tastes of one not seen since this dynasty's reign."

The boy agreed, and the white fox – Inari, he later learned – became his closest friend. With Inari, he learned how to use Chakra, and created jutsu of all sorts. For years they traveled together across the lands, and he learned much about Inari.

The kitsune was one of the Elders – the Kitsune that had reached nine tails by age alone. His name he took after the divine Kitsune, whom he wanted to someday meet. Inari spoke of tales of Kitsune eventually gaining a tenth tail, one not earned by age but by some other means. He pondered that perhaps it was power that brought about the tenth tail – after all, he reasoned, with age comes power, and with that power, a new tail.

They wandered to the edges of the earth, learning more and more about it. They witnessed the ends of wars, the starts of wars, and even found themselves stopping wars. He created artifacts, weapons of purification that would aid in cleansing the world of all evils. The man became called a Sage, for he was wiser than all, and found that slowly, he was changing. His eyes became like ripples in water, and he could see the Chakra in everything. And with that sight came understanding, a knowledge of everything and all that was. Some nights he woke to find visions of a future not yet occurring, of twin boys of his own blood.

The Sage's skin began to darken purple, his teeth becoming ever longer and ever sharper, his hair turning the deep red of blood, and he felt the beginnings of horns grow from atop his forehead. He was becoming something more, something ethereal and eternal.

He returned to his homeland, and found that it was atop a massive source of energy darker and denser and heavier than even the Sage's own Chakra. Inari bound to it with glee, tapping into and absorbing that power before the Sage could even protest against it. Inari called it the Source, the origin of the Sage's power, and took it into himself.

It corrupted.

The Juubi was created, and the Sage was left to battle his nearest and dearest friend. Mountains were raised and fallen, and oceans created and lost, until the Sage was left with no choice. He took hold of the beast that had once been his friend, and took it into himself. A sacrifice, he called himself, whose power would hold the Juubi at bay until death took them both.

He called himself Jinchuuriki, a being no longer human, and sequestered himself away from all but one, a woman whom he had dreamt of, who bore him twin boys. The elder has eyes unlike his, more akin to the Juubi, and believed that power was the way to peace – like Inari. The younger had power more like the Sage's, and believed that love and understanding was the way to peace.

The Sage could feel himself become less and less human over the years, and could see further and further into the future. He saw nine beasts, the Biju, and how they used to be one entity. They were the Juubi, the Sage came to realize, and they were the path to Inari's redemption.

Near the time of his death, he split the Juubi into nine, gave the Biju names, and told them to see the world for what it was, and to wait for a time when they would become whole again. At that time, a new Sage would arise, bringing peace to the being that they once were and ushering in a new era. They accepted, and dispersed across the earth.

To aid humanity, the Sage took it upon himself to alter reality, to give and awaken Chakra in all people, so they might learn as he had, and grow as he had.

As recompense for the Kitsune, for the shame brought upon them by one of their own, the Sage created the Summon Lands, filled with animal Summons who would hold the wisdom of ages past and teach the humans about ages long past, and the peace that would one day exist.

For his sons, the Sage looked to his younger child, and bequeathed unto him a boon: the Sage's blessing. The younger child was to spread his teachings to all that would listen, to all that could listen. The elder child, seeing this as a slight to his honor, declared that he would prove his father wrong, that his way was the correct path and it was misguided to believe only in the younger child.

Upon his death, the Sage found himself before the gods, and that because of his actions he was to be cursed to exist in a state between life and death, guiding lost souls and to remain until such a time that his actions come undone.

The Sage, now called Shinigami, remained in that limbo world, growing older and wiser and more distant from humanity. And so he would remain, until a boy called Uzumaki Naruto gave up his connection to the Biju, and the Unsealing of an evil far worse and far greater than even the Juubi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i've had this exact chapter done for just shy of a year, and been planning it for the three years before that. 
> 
> this ending has been a long time coming.


	50. And So It Ends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for going on this journey with me.

The Shinigami finished its tale, and Naruto shivered. He never liked stories with sad endings, always preferring the ones where the hero wins and returns home to a village cheering him on. He'd always imagined a future where that would happen, where one day he would wake up and put on the Hokage's hat and step outside and people would smile at him. Where people would be happy to see him, and cheer for him, and...

But that was years ago. Before the banishment. Before Sasuke left. Before broken promises and broken hearts.

“So the Juubi,” Yagura finally said, breaking the silence, “was your friend?”

“ **Yes.** ” The Shinigami inclined its head. “ **He still is, in a way. Our business is yet unfinished. I could not bring myself to purify him of this poison, to rid the world of it for good. That is my sin.** ”

“What do we have to do with it?” Yugito asked, rubbing at her arms.

“We're dead,” Utakata bluntly said. “There's nothing we can do.”

“ **I hold domain over life and death,** ” the Shinigami said. “ **One dies when I say so. And for you nine, I have not spoken.** ”

“So we're gonna be alive,” Roshi said, “just in time for the world to end. Sounds like fun.”

“ **The Juubi can be stopped** ,” the Shinigami said, looking over them all. “ **I have the abilities required to purge the world of the poison infecting my friend. But there is a cost.** ”

“You cannot appear in the living world.” Yagura's eyes sharpened. “So you ask us to take on your power.”

“Hold on,” Roshi interjected. “What's the catch here? It's gotta be something bad, or you wouldn't say anything.”

The Shinigami tilted its head, considering. Naruto felt a chill in his bones when it finally responded. “ **You would hold the powers of death, my powers. You would die. A hero in the eyes of the world, yes, but still die.** ”

“And you can't do it?” Naruto squeaked, and hated how his voice squeaked. “There's no way for us to come back to life and you battle the Juubi?”

The Shinigami turned its attention to Naruto. It looked old, in that moment, and so impossibly human. “ **No. I hold no form in the living world. This power I am cursed with is too great to be held within that plane. There was once a ritual your family created to Summon me to the living world, but you have neither the time nor the means to complete it.** ”

“Why?” Yagura asked. “And how? I have studied the Uzumaki clan scrolls extensively, and I saw nothing of this ritual.”

“ **It is obscure, and lost to your time.** ” The Shinigami glanced at Yagura. “ **It requires that one becomes my avatar to the living world, a tether connected the two of us. Your soul becomes connected to mine, and for a brief time my powers are yours, and your powers are mine.** ”

Naruto blinked, realization settling in. “Would this person die?”

The Shinigami returned its attention to Naruto, a similar glint in its eyes. “ **Yes.** ”

“And they would die a hero?” Naruto asked, lowering his arms to his side. “For stopping this war.”

“ **They would become a legend in their own right,** ” the Shinigami replied. “ **But in this instance I know not what the consequences of becoming my avatar would bring. To purge the Juubi would require soul suicide. His and mine.** ”

“So we're damned if we do, and damned if we don't,” Utakata said.

“Hold on,” Roshi said, stepping forward. “You're not suggesting that we go through with this?”

“I'm not,” Naruto assured the older man. “I'm saying that's it me.”

“You?” Roshi barked a laugh, then paused when Naruto didn't smile. “Kid, you can't be serious? You'll die!”

“ **My role fulfills a need in the universe,** ” the Shinigami stated. “ **To do this requires creating a power vacuum that cannot exist. Are you certain in your decision?** ”

It wasn't a question. Both Naruto and the Shinigami knew the answer. He nodded.

“You can't do this!” Roshi cried, taking Naruto by the shoulders. “You'd die! Is this really what you want?”

“No,” Naruto said, his voice dull. “It's not what I want. But it's what the world needs.”

Gaara and Fu stepped forward. Naruto offered his two closest friends a sad smile. Gaara stared Naruto down. “You are certain in this?”

“I only just realized,” Naruto admitted. “Back in-in Konoha, Jiraiya, he... he took me to see the Toad Elder. It was weird, because he kept forgetting who I was, but then... he saw my future. Or dreamed it, it was really confusing. But! He looked into my future, and saw death covering the world. I told him that it must've been because I was touched by the Shinigami. And now, with it–him, I guess–talking about sharing the souls it just. Fell into place. I gave it that piece of my soul back then, and it returned Kurama to me. So... that's it. The connection's already set up. I am the avatar of the Shinigami.”

“You could die,” Fu said. She raised a hand, moving to touch him, but stopped herself, dropped her arm to her side.

“These might be our last words to each other,” Naruto said, looking like he wanted to hold her close. He didn't know how a hug worked, like this. How could he hold someone close, knowing that his was going to his death? What should he say, what should he do? “So. Fu. There's no– I'm not– I... like you. A lot. Maybe a lot more than you think. Maybe this is... love? I... love you?” He froze, let out a breath. “I love you. A lot. Even if you never grow to love humanity, but... try. For my sake. People can change. We did. It won't be easy, I know, but... I know. I love you. I will always love you.”

Fu nodded. She looked emotional, far too much for any of the teens to know how to handle. Naruto did the best he could, and turned to Gaara.

“You're my best friend. The _best_ best friend I could ever ask for. I'm glad that happened.” There wasn't anything else for them to talk about. There was nothing more for them to say.

“I'm glad to have been your friend, Naruto.” Gaara– Naruto blinked, surprised at the raw emotion in his friend's voice. His face softened, and he gave in, pulling both teens into a hug. It was awkward, and they had to adjust far too much, but it brought tears to his eyes.

Utakata and Yugito came in, gently pulled them apart, and Roshi and Han faced Naruto.

“Kid,” Roshi began, “I am not an old man. Not even close. But you made me feel old. It was awful. And I would never give up the last several years. I feel younger now than I ever did. Because of you. I learned to let loose, and embrace that responsible side that I used to think I hate. Now I hate it a little less. Because of you.”

“Brother.” Han put a hand on Roshi's shoulder. “Stop.”

“Right.” Roshi nodded. “You helped a lot. Han wouldn't have tried to get back together with our family without this big, weird... whatever the hell we are that you created. None of this could have happened without you.”

“That's true.” Han nodded. “You changed our lives. We're alive because of you.”

“Okay, that's enough,” Utakata stepped in, pulling Naruto close. “But they're right. We're alive. And our lives are more awesome for that.”

“So you and Yugito are gonna talk?” Roshi asked, giving Utakata a shove toward the others.

“I'm– That's– That is a delicate situation, okay, and I... will talk to her. About emotions. Maybe a relationship. For Naruto's sake.”

“Don't stop being awesome,” Naruto said. “For all our sakes.”

“I won't.” He glanced at the remaining ones. “You don't really know Yugito and Bee. Do you have any last words for them?”

Naruto looked over at where Yugito was comforting Fu–and had her hand pressed against Bee's face, keeping him from speaking. “Wish Yugito luck. It was fun to meet her, and I wish we'd gotten more time together. Especially with Bee. He seems like a really awesome guy.

“Yagura!” Naruto raised his voice. “You're an awesome teacher, and a great leader. I have learned so much about my family and myself because of you. Keep everyone safe and happy. Especially Fu and Gaara. They need someone there to help them with their emotions.” His voice cracked. “Utakata, listen to Han in the kitchen. He knows more than you. And don't stop trying to make Roshi laugh. You'll succeed one of these days.”

“ **All endings are new beginnings.** ” The Shinigami laid a cold hand on Naruto's shoulder. “ **It is time.** ”

“I guess this is goodbye.” Naruto tried to smile, his eyes too wet to look clearly. “I'm so happy to have known you. All of you. You made my life so much better than I ever imagined. I try to imagine what my future is like and it just makes me so happy. I'm just so happy right now. So be happy, and live happy lives. Live the lives that we were supposed to.”

Everything became cold, then warm. Everything went white.

~~~***~~~

Out of all the things that Kankuro expected from this war, Uchiha Madara was not one of them.

He'd read the intel, been given a briefing on what was known about the masked man's appearance and abilities, and what the ambush squad found was neither of those.

It was almost pure chance that they had come upon the Akatsuki's hideout. Kankuro had run under the idea that the enemy knew of his coming, but from the looks of it all, he had not been correct.

It was just his luck that his team find the masked man just in time to see him die at the hands of Uchiha Madara – the _real_ Madara, although he had the pallor and look of an Edo Tensei. As it stood, he was toying with the ambush squad, batting away their attacks like a parent humoring a toddler trying to attack and defeat them.

Kankuro stepped back, keeping an eye on the rest of the area. There was a massive Seal across the clearing, every line glowing and feeding into the growing mass at the middle of it. There were eleven bodies scattered at ten points along the edge of the Seal. Two of them were together, surrounded by ash and even from so far away Kankuro could smell the stink of them.

The rest were the Jinchuuriki.

Ko had confirmed that they were all alive, barely, and had been horrified to mention that it looked like the Seal was extracting all the tailed beasts at once, feeding their chakra and selves into the mass at the center.

Kankuro had ordered his team to engage Madara, keeping a careful distance, while he and Kiri retrieved the Jinchuuriki. None of them had any clue what the Jinchuuriki were doing there, but it was imperative that the Seal be stopped. Whatever Madara's plans were, it involved the successful extraction of the tailed beasts.

Kankuro sent out chakra threads, wisps so thin to be invisible, and latched onto the nearest Jinchuuriki. Swiftly, he yanked, pulling the Jinchuuriki – the girl from Kumo, Nii Yugito – toward him. The Seal pulsed, and Kiri confirmed that she was still alive, if barely, but it started their plan. Kankuro went by twos, each hand sending out chakra strings to latch onto a Jinchuuriki and pull them to safety. Each time the mass at the center shuddered, but the Seal remained active. Soon, Kankuro and Kiri had circled the Seal, having gotten all but one of the Jinchuuriki. The only one left was Uzumaki Naruto, and his body was beside Madara.

Who was looking right at Kankuro.

“You're an annoyance at best,” Madara said, and Kankuro kept his gaze on the enemy. None of his team were engaging the zombie, which meant they were either incapacitated, or dead. “I've only indulged you so far purely because it's too late for you to stop this. The Juubi is already reforming, and soon the Seal will redirect its power down into the cage, shattering it and awakening the demon within.”

Behind Kankuro, Gaara groaned. Madara tilted his head, considering. Kankuro gestured for Kiri to see to Gaara, not taking his eyes off of the enemy. Madara was a legend, a death bringer for all who opposed him. Kankuro couldn't afford to divert his attention, not here, not now.

“He's alive!” Kiri exclaimed, shocked. Matching groans from the other Jinchuuriki started up, and Kankuro saw Madara's attention shift behind him. “They're all– the Jinchuuriki, all of them are–”

“Still alive?” Madara hummed, raising an eyebrow. “Now that _is_ fascinating. How long do they have before they succumb to the extraction, I wonder? Usually it's the Uzumaki that's– urk!”

Kankuro jerked as Madara fell to his knees. His gray body started to flake, pieces of ash falling away. Behind him, Uzumaki Naruto stood, looking like a specter of death.

“How?!” Madara looked behind him, at the purple spreading across his skin. He seemed to be glowing– no, Kankuro realized with dread. He was glowing. And smoking, or both and the same.

A hand settled on Kankuro's shoulder, and he turned to see Yagura looking at Naruto. The other Jinchuuriki were also awake, and all of them were looking at Naruto, silent. One by one, each of them nodded. Naruto, in return, nodded.

“Let's go.” Kankuro could only nod. Whatever was happening, the remaining Jinchuuriki were leaving it to Naruto.

Kankuro swallowed. He gestured for his squad – all of them alive, thank the gods – to each take a Jinchuuriki and retreat to HQ. Their job was to save the Jinchuuriki, or at least distract Madara. With both jobs done, it was time to bring the targets back. Glancing back, Kankuro blinked again sure he saw– but no, that couldn't be it.

How could Naruto even vanish between blinks, like a ghost?

~~~***~~~

Naruto felt powerful, more than he had in all his life. It almost terrified him, how he could look at someone like the dead soul before him and feel little more than mild interest.

“Whoa.” Naruto looked at Madara as his body fell apart, his spirit ascending onto the next plane. Feeling out, Naruto latched his attention on the other threads of spirits, of Edo Tensei, and forcibly sent them on. His skin grew darker, tougher, and he could feel horns start to grow out of his head. “This is strange.”

“ **For a time, you and I are one.** ” The Shinigami's voice came from everywhere and nowhere. “ **You have access and use of all that I have, all that I am. Do not linger too long, else this power will burn through you and I both.** ”

“But I'm still going to die.” 

“ **Two beings cannot occupy the same space, cannot share this power. One must die for the other to continue.** ” Naruto's attention turned away from the fleeing Ambush Squad, away from his friends and family, and to his real target. The Juubi's form began to solidify, condensing into a monstrous form. One eye opened, red and glaring, and focused in on Naruto. “ **The one in control is the one who dies. Give in to me, completely.** ”

“What will that do?” The Juubi raised a foreleg. 

“ **You are young. It is ill-advised that you die for my sins. Rather, I would ask that you take my place, my role.** ” The Shinigami sounded old, and weary. “ **It is only fitting that I accomplish now what I could not millennia ago. Back then, I could not bring myself to kill my friend. Now, I will sacrifice myself to bring an end to his suffering.** ”

Naruto nodded, giving control. It felt odd, letting go of control. It wasn't like when he was training with Kurama, where he lost awareness of the world – where he was left in his mindscape. Here, there was no mindscape, there was just a separation of existence. He was, but he wasn't. It was his body, but it also wasn't. 

He was Naruto, but he was also the Shinigami. 

And he was going to fight. 

~~~***~~~

“Report.” 

“Eight of the nine Jinchuuriki were saved. The ninth, Uzumaki Naruto, was left behind at the site. The Ambush Squad met with the forward unit, and returned for Naruto. However, there was no physical evidence of him having ever been there. Nor of the creature the Jinchuuriki are claiming was the Juubi. Chakra evidence left at the site has confirmed the Ambush Squad's report of Edo Tensei on the true Uchiha Madara, the Juubi, and that Uzumaki Naruto was, in fact, there. We have our best people studying the site and surrounding areas for a trail to follow, but hopes are slim.”

Mabui finished the report, and Jiraiya frowned. The victory was what they'd hoped for, but it felt far too hollow. The Edo Tensei had been removed from the battlefield, the White Zetsu were all destroyed, and the Jinchuuriki were brought back alive – even though they couldn't be counted as such anymore. Miracle of miracles, the Jinchuuriki survived extraction. They were alive, without the added benefit that came from having a tailed beast. 

And that was something as well. The tailed beasts were destroyed. They weren't just the first former Jinchuuriki, they apparently were the  _ last _ Jinchuuriki. 

“What now?” Jiraiya looked out at the Kage. “Is this alliance of ours over?”

“The war is over.” Ay stood, moving to leave the room. “Spread the word. Gather the dead, pay our respects for the fallen, let the injured heal. We're alive, and I don't know about you, but war is exhausting. This alliance shall stand. Do you agree?”

“Peace is good.” Tsunade nodded. “I'm good with the alliance standing.”

“War is exhausting.” Kitsuchi agreed. “Let this one be the last.”

“You young'uns are too idealistic,” Chiyo commented. “But let this war be our last. The Mizukage would agree, I believe, were she here as well. Kiri has just come out of its own civil war.”

“The Daimyo will be informed of this decision, but I do believe that we've just achieved world peace. Congratulations,” Jiraiya dryly commented. “Our forefathers would be proud.”

“ _ Your _ forefathers,” Ay grumbled without bite. 

“An appreciable sentiment nonetheless,” Kitsuchi added. “This war, the Fourth Great Shinobi World War, is over.”

~~~***~~~

Peace. 

He didn't know that it would feel so calm, that he would feel so calm. Calm, and light, the two parts of peace. 

The world was white, was blank, was empty. 

The Sage was gone, dead with the Juubi. Kurama, Shukaku, Isobu, all the tailed beasts were gone with them. He was alone, but not lonely. 

He was kept busy, people calling out for him for safety, for passage. He gave it to them, offered them their own peace with a smile, a nod, and a promise. 

“It's you.”

He nodded, not trusting himself to speak. Not with this person. 

“Did you greet the others?” 

Again, he nodded. 

“Will you come with me?” 

“ **Not yet.** ” He had time left, until the last of them was done. 

“You're waiting until the last of us have passed?”

He nodded. 

“And the others, they're waiting as well?” 

“ **Until the very end.** ”

Yagura offered Naruto a smile, and reached out. “I'm not sure if you want a hug, but if it makes you feel better...”

Naruto grinned, big a wide. He pulled Yagura in close. “ **One thing you learn is how to give a good hug to somebody. I'll see you in a while, me and Gaara.** ”

“Not Fu?”

“ **She's not the last.** ” Naruto's grin faded, a little. “ **I'm still looking forward to meeting with her. Hearing about her life.** ”

“Do you want to hear about my life?” Yagura offered, and Naruto nodded. He knew the cause of death, knew when someone was killed before their time, but not the life they had lived. “Well, it all started when I boarded a ship...”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
